Tale Of Two Legends
by Vorandul
Summary: One, a life giver that took his world with blood and iron. The other, a reluctant hero running from his mistakes. One enjoys violence and power while the other just wants peace. How will Remnant deal with the appearance of two Wasteland legends? Not to mention the unusual alliance of old enemies that come hunting for revenge and a new world ripe for the taking.
1. Chapter 1

_**Hey, guys! This is one of my new projects with two of my favorite worlds, Fallout and RWBY. Hope you guys enjoy!**_

* * *

 **Chapter 1**

 _The field the man found himself in a barren, empty field. He could see nothing for miles around; there weren't even any clouds in the sky. It was at this point that he noticed that there wasn't any sound either. A situation like this didn't scare him, but it sure as hell unnerved him. With no other option available, he just shrugged and began walking forward, hoping that he eventually found something. He kept walking for what seemed like hours, still nothing in sight. However, he had a nagging feeling that something or someone was watching him, and had been for quite some time. If whatever it was chose to attack him, he was all but defenseless; a far cry from his usual situation. He stopped, deciding to see if he could potentially coax out whatever it was._

 _Before long, the man felt an intense amount of heat scorch his back along with light so bright that it threatened to blind him even with his back turned. Although his mind screamed at him to stay as he was, he overrode the overwhelming sense of dread and turned. What met him brought back a flood of horrifying memories. Two massive grey mushroom clouds towered over the horizon, with a distinct and horribly familiar set of ruins sitting under each. Craning his neck to the very top of the clouds, he saw a distinctive emblem carved into each of them, as if a master craftsman had taken to plying his trade. On the left stood a clear image of a two-headed bear and on the other a rearing bull sat in the other. A third great blast of light shone in the middle of the two, causing the man to cover his eyes with his forearm, lest they burn out of their sockets. Hesitantly lowering his arm, he found a mushroom cloud much larger than those that flanked it and the silhouetted form of a man standing in front. It took his eyes a moment to adjust to the light, but once he could make out the newcomer's features, His eyes widened in shock. This also happened to be the moment that the screams hit him. He collapsed to his knees, cupping his ears to desperately try and block out all the pain, anger, and shock that those screams held. He felt his eyes well up in salty tears, for the first time in many years. He had caused those screams. He had given the clouds life. It didn't even register to him that the ground below him cracked and broke open, a fiery glow emanating from below. It was only at the last second that he managed to grab some form of purchase, but even that was tenuous. As he desperately clung to the cliff, he looked above him to see the newcomer above, looking down on him with a look of simple indifference on his face. The figure knelt down as if to help him, yet offered none; he just continued to stare. As his hand left the cliff, he heard the newcomer growl underneath his gasmask._

" _You can go home now, Courier"_

* * *

The Courier bolted upright, a cold sweat soaking his sheets and body. He began massaging his temples, trying to forget anything and everything about his nightmare. He'd had this dream many times before, in addition to many others, over the years. The frequency and intensity came and went at largely random intervals, although he realized that he'd had this particular nightmare much more frequently than the others. As much as he'd hoped that living a solitary existence in the Zion wilderness could bring him some measure of peace, at the same time he knew how naive that notion truly was. At this point, he'd grown used to the nightmares and the lack of peace but that didn't mean he had to like it.

Pulling himself out of bed, Six stretched himself out and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. Letting his eyes adjust to his surroundings, he let a small smile creep onto his face. No matter how many times he looked at it, he was always supremely impressed and happy with himself over the improvements he'd made to his current home, the old Ranger Substation Peregrine. He'd kept a lot of what was already here, with minor repairs and adjustments of course; two centuries of abandonment and misuse tended to leave things in less than ideal living conditions. He'd managed to find a serviceable trunk in an old trailer at the nearby campground at Virgin Fork, which he used to keep typical Wastelander clothes, random supplies, and trinkets. The repaired bookshelf was full of intact pre-war books (courtesy of of a raid on House's penthouse and New Canaan merchants) of various genres while the table was covered with various random objects, par for the course as far as Six was concerned. He'd covered up most of the large open window space with timber he'd salvaged from the crates in the storage space underneath the station and whatever else he could find. A small section was left open to let some natural light in, of course, but Six had created curtains from scrap metal and leftover clothes. All in all, they'd worked better than expected.

Six walked through the makeshift door, also made of excess clothes, and walked down to the nearby Eastern Virgin. This was a daily routine of his, washing himself in the river and cleaning himself up. When he'd first started bathing regularly, he found it extremely refreshing. Sure, he'd taken plenty of showers back at the Lucky 38 but even those had been few and far between. He couldn't help but chuckle to himself at the memory. It'd been nearly seven years since he'd last stepped foot in Vegas. Although he sometimes missed the brights lights and the activity of the city, Six was content with staying in Zion. He'd left much of that life behind, especially after everything that'd happened at the Dam and the Divide. Besides, the Mojave reminded him too much of all the mistakes he'd made; it held nothing left for him and it sure as hell didn't want him. He paid plenty of attention to what happened in the Mojave so he'd heard of the numerous legends and tales surrounding him. It didn't surprise him all that much that he wasn't held in the highest regard. He'd left all that behind a long time ago however; he could care less what they thought of him at this point.

Drying himself off in a homemade towel, Six changed himself into a simple white t-shirt and some faded blue jeans with some black hiking boots. Walking back towards the substation, he made sure to flex his artificial arm. He'd lost it courtesy of a showdown with the Legendary Deathclaw back in the Mojave, one of the toughest fights he'd ever had. Thanks to the Think Tank back at the Big Empty, though, he'd managed to get one hell of a replacement arm. Klein had assured him that it was nigh-indestructible (although he had yet to test that boast and frankly had no plans to try) and that it would never malfunction. So far, it had lived up to its claimed reputation. To avoid any potential problems with people, he'd had Klein and Dala create an artificial skin to cover it. To all but the most perceptive people, it looked like a regular arm; he'd had to dial down all the extra features that Klein had built in, obviously, but that didn't bug Six much.

Grabbing the key to the ground floor room from upstairs, Six opened up his workshop. It was yet one more addition to his home and had proven quite useful. He'd covered up most of the hole with excess material from upstairs and scrap metal with the door coming from one of the other substations; the door had taken up nearly all of his weight limit but he'd been able to move by some miracle. Once he'd cleared out the boxes, the Courier had found the alcove much bigger than he'd thought; he'd managed to grab various tools, a re-purposed pool table, a small workbench, and a reloading bench from the surrounding areas and buildings although it'd been a pain to move even with help from both the Sorrows and Dead Horses (that had further added to the problem considering how scared they were of pre war buildings). The shop was littered with parts, tools, and weapons while off to the other side was a trunk for gear and armor. One of the center pieces was a homemade stand holding his Elite Riot Gear, one of the most worthwhile things he'd picked up from his escapes in the Divide. On the pool table-turned-bench sat several different weapons, such as his anti-material rifle and 25mm APW. Moving to the trunk, he cracked it open and pulled out his Assassin Suit, a prewar prototype from the Big Empty. Changing his clothes and replacing them in the trunk, Six grabbed La Longue Carabine from the workbench. Closing the shop back up, he began heading towards The Red Gate.

 _Might as well do something hunting today_ , Six thought as he jogged towards the arch.

It was dusk by the time the Courier was finished. Unfortunately, he had little luck; nothing overly substantial showed up and even the common Bighorners decided to stay away. While Six was less than pleased, it didn't really bug him too much. Between trading for food with caravaners, foraging, and trading with the Dead Horses and Sorrows, Six had plenty of food to last him quite a bit. Hunting was more of pastime, one he found surprisingly enjoyable. It felt much better to gather supplies and materials from something that couldn't potentially rip you to shreds (he still had plenty of scars from Red Lucy's little hunting escapades she'd sent him on). One thing that had weirded him out, though, was strange noises he'd heard coming from Two Skies, the cave right in between the Gate and Peregrine. It happened off and on, but enough that it freaked out any tribals or animals who went by. He'd been asked by Daniel a few times to check it out, but he'd never bothered too; frankly, he thought it was just one of the many wasteland creatures in the area that had decided to make its home inside. As long as it didn't bother anyone, he found no point in investigating. However, the Courier didn't yet realize just how important that cave would be.

* * *

 _ **Not sure how this first chapter sounds as this is my first crossover but I'm hoping you all enjoyed! Prologue 4 and it's full story are also coming soon and still in the works so don't worry. Constructive criticism and tips always welcome!**_


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

Six rushed back to Peregrine and scrambled to open the workshop door. He wasn't easily spooked, especially after everything he'd encountered during his travels but this nearly put everything previous to shame. He'd been walking back to Peregrine, thinking about Two Skies when, sure enough, something walked out of the cave in question. It had been unlike anything the Courier had ever seen. The creature was definitely some sort of wolf but it stood on two legs and was black as night. Its eyes burned like the fires of hell and its face was covered by some sort of white plate with a strange red line pattern flowing throughout it. The thing had squeezed out of the cave's entrance and had looked around before settling on Six. Almost immediately, the wolf thing attacked. The Courier had just barely dodged the creature's lunge and had managed to bring La Longue Carabine to bear. He had sworn underneath his breath when the .357 rounds had done absolutely nothing except piss it off even more. The thing had lunged at him again and grazed him before Six had managed to digitize his Ranger Sequoia from his Pip-Boy. Somehow, he'd kept hold of it despite all the jumping and dodging he'd done. Two .45-70s to the chest and one to the head (thank god it'd driven through the plate) had put the thing down. Before he'd even had a chance to catch his breath, Six had heard plenty of growls and strange noises coming out of Two Skies. That had settled it, he needed to investigate. If more of those things were living in the cave, then he had to kill them all before they escaped and wreaked havoc through Zion.

 _Well, that and its about time I got some good combat practice in_ , Six thought as he grabbed his best weapons and digitized them into his Pip-boy. As much as he wanted it, it was clear La Longue Carabine wouldn't cut it against those wolves, so he upgraded to his scoped Trail Carbine instead. Deciding against his current Assassin Suit and needing something more mobile, Six searched throughout his armor trunk for something suitable. He sighed as he found nothing, only for one last article of clothing to come to mind. He disliked the idea of donning the armor, but found it necessary. He'd severely stripped down in terms of the number of armors he had, keeping only those that were unique or incredibly useful to him. He cursed himself for such a stupid decision as he grabbed a shovel and walked out to the side of the substation.

Dragging out the dirty and tarnished trunk, he inspected it to make sure it was still airtight. Satisfied, he clicked the old latches and let the lid pop open. Inside sat the last true remains of his old life before the Dam or even before the blasted Platinum Chip.

His own personal duster and the staff known as Old Glory stared back at him, looking as good as new. He remembered exiting the Divide, being surprised to find the duster and the staff sitting inside a case just outside the exit. He'd worn it at the Dam but had never worn it since, opting to bury it along with everything else relating to the man that was The Courier as the Mojave knew him.

"Well, at least it still fits. Just as comfortable as I remember too" Six mumbled under his breath, rolling and flexing his joints in order to get re-acquainted with his old friend. He was about to re-bury the case before he found his gaze falling back on Old Glory. As much as he hated the damn thing, he couldn't shake the feeling that it might come in handy. Plus, he just thought it would look cool in action one last time. Lifting up the lightweight staff, he hit a button on his Pip-boy and watched the staff digitize itself. Kicking the trunk back into the hole and haphazardly reburying it, he locked the workshop back up and trudged back to Two Skies.

"Forgot how wet this place was" Six said aloud, water splashing around his boots as he made his way through the cave. He had his pride and joy, what he'd dubbed the Service Rifle Mk. 2 (he was never all that creative), readied in front of him, while the Sequoia sat on his hip. He could still hear the growling from earlier, but so far he'd found nothing. It wasn't long until he reached the main chamber, currently filled to waist height with water. What awaited him through him for a loop.

"Oh, for fuck's sake" Six said as he stared at the scene in front of him. A massive bear, looking similar to the wolf with slightly different designs on its plates, was currently struggling to wade through the water. Behind it was, of all things, a floating orb of light. Now, Six had taken some weird chems during his time traveling the Mojave and beyond and, as such, had seen some weird things resulting from those trips. This, however, possibly topped everything, even the flaming bear with massive paws. What was worse, the already pissed off black furred bear decided to take its anger out on _him_. Not making the same mistake twice, Six levelled his gun at the creature's head and began squeezing the trigger as fast as he could. He watched as the Mk 2's .308 rounds cut through the bear and clearly damaged it, yet the thing showed no sign of stopping. The monster swiped, barely missing Six as he rolled out of the way. As Six got back up, the Mk 2 had been replaced by a .45 Auto SMG. The bear comically paused as it looked at Six, who had a lopsided grin on his face.

"Welcome to Zion" Six said before emptying the weapon's entire fifty round magazine into the creature. That sealed its fate, as it staggered back from the sheer volume of fire being sent down range. The black bear let out one last angry cry before collapsing and dissolving. Six watched, at this point not really ready to question exactly what was going on. Before he could continue searching however, Six heard a loud crackling sound emanate from behind him. Turning around, he watched the ball of light rapidly expand in his direction, too fast for him to escape. The last thing on Six's mind as the ball engulfed him was _Well, this is gonna suck_.

* * *

Unbeknownst to Six, he had been under watch ever since he had encountered the strange black wolf. The lone figure had watched as Six had fought the creature, dug up his old equipment and ventured into the cave. He watched from a pair of binoculars as a bright flash of light briefly emanated from Two Skies Cave before disappearing just as fast. The figure smiled wolfishly as he lowered his binos and replaced them at his hip. Making his way back down from his perch, the Red Gate, he afforded himself one last look back before continuing onwards.

"Prepare yourself, Courier. Hell is coming your way, no matter where you are" the figure said smugly as one last slide down the Gate's side loosed a medallion from underneath the figure's shirt. A sly gold fox was carved on the medallion, running around a rearing bull. Only one man had the skills necessary to track a man who had buried all traces of his past. In due time, he would finally catch the prey he'd been searching for all these years. All in due time.

 **A/N: The Service Rifle Mk 2 is the early 'Hollywood Model' Ar-10, a predecessor of sorts to the AR-15. I've always loved how the gun looks and thought that it would be a nice edition to the Courier's arsenal. He quite a bit of firepower with him, but I won't reveal it all just yet :) Hope you guys enjoyed!**


	3. Chapter 3

**_Finally, its here! I apologize for how long its taken getting this up. Between university, home life, and a slight procrastination issue on my part, it took much long than planned. Anyways, hope you all enjoy!_**

 **Chapter 3**

As Knight Sergeant Wilks ran through the ruins of downtown DC, he thought about how he'd ended up in his current predicament. He remembered hearing how the Citadel had fallen and been completely destroyed, wiping out most of the Brotherhood forces in the Capital Wasteland. He remembered how the Galaxy News Radio building had been attacked by a massive unknown force, one that had quickly overrun the building and killed most of the Brotherhood. He remembered fleeing with Three Dog and a few more survivors out the back of the building while it was ransacked, how they'd run for their lives. He remembered finding a friendly settlement, only to find it overrun with more of the same men that had attacked GNR and the ensuing firefight that had left only Wilks and Three Dog alive. He remembered joining the resistance and finally getting answers. Most of all, however, Wilks remembered _him_ , the Lone Wanderer. He'd watched as the Wanderer had barreled through GNR's defenders with nothing more than two Chinese Officer Swords and a Chinese Pistol, slaughtering everyone he came across and only leaving survivors for the men with him. Wilks had discovered that the Wanderer was responsible for the destruction of the Brotherhood of Steel and had taken complete control of the Wasteland with a massive home grown army that had seemingly sprung up from nowhere.

They'd taken control of almost every major settlement across the Capitol, save a few that had outright allied themselves with the Wanderer's forces; considering they were settlements like Paradise Falls and Evergreen Mills, this was really no surprise. As Wilks stopped to catch his breath, he tried to think of any reason as to why the Wanderer had betrayed them, even after he'd helped them. It had been almost eleven years since the attack yet to this day no one truly knew why the Wanderer had done what he had or how he'd gained control so fast aside from the man himself. Hearing more running, shouting, and barking from behind him, Wilks immediately took off down the street. His thoughts would be ones for another day. Of course, that is if he even survived today.

Wilks had been tasked with scouting deep behind enemy lines, near the Wanderer's fortress in the Capitol Building. Everything had gone good at first; he'd somehow been able to evade the huge amount of guards surrounding the place and had gotten to a relatively good vantage point overlooking the back entrance. The resistance movement set up by Brotherhood survivors had been planning a covert attack on the Capitol for nearly two years and they needed everything to be perfect if they had any hope of pulling it off, especially the intelligence. The hope was that the attack would divert enough troops away from other vital areas that the resistance could launch crippling attacks against major infrastructure or at least what passed for it. Many, including Wilks himself, felt that hoping for such success was a complete pipe dream and, frankly, a suicide attack. The older members that had seen the Lone Wanderer fight knew that he could pretty much stave off an attack on his own with laughably minimal support. After all, this was a man who'd single-handedly taken both of the Enclave's biggest and most well-defended facilities without any real trouble. Not only that, the man seemed nearly impervious to damage. Wilks and others had seen him blown up, shot at, and even hit by a mini nuke and a _satellite launched missile_ with almost no injuries. A lot of people thought that he was immortal, but it was much more likely that he'd received augments of all kinds that had boosted his damage threshold and pain tolerance to near insane levels. All in all, he was _the_ most dangerous entity in the Wasteland and everyone knew it, including the Wanderer.

"Come on out, Brother! We know you're there!" Wilks froze as he heard one of his pursuers try and coax him out. It was most likely the Wanderer's Black Watch, made up of those Brotherhood soldiers loyal to the Wanderer and ex-Enclave members who'd joined his army after he'd seized control. They were well-equipped with blackened T-45d power armor along with both laser and plasma rifles, weapons which did serious damage in trained hands. Wilks had heard stories about resistance members captured by the Black Watch and what they were subjected to. They rarely, if ever, survived.

Wilks poked his head out from behind his cover to find, sure enough, a Black Watchman. However, the man was alone and fortunately wasn't looking in Wilks's direction. Seeing no other course of action, Wilks withdrew his combat knife and slowly crept up behind the ex-Brotherhood member. Given the fact that he'd spent much of his life wearing it, Wilks knew the weak points of the T-45d that could be exploited with a well-placed knife or sharp object. Checking his surroundings one last time and deciding it was clear, Wilks jumped onto the man's back and drove the knife down into the padding separating the rim of the armor's neck and the wearer's neck. Wilks felt the blade glide through and the armored man immediately fell forward, his spine severed. Wrenching the knife around just to make sure the man was dead, Wilks withdrew his knife and wiped the blood and spinal fluid on the man's armor.

"Stop! Hands up, asshole!" Wilks spun around to find a full squad of troops levelling Assault Rifles at him. Although they were thankfully not Black Watch, the Wanderer's regular troops had a reputation for brutality and cruelty; they'd been reigned in over the last few years, but against 'enemies of the state', they had free reign. Wilks felt a hard object impact the back of his head, most likely a rifle butt. As he struggled to stay awake, to no avail, Wilks managed to hear the words he hoped he never would.

"Sir, we have him. Let the boss know he's about to have a new friend"

* * *

"Hey, wake up."

Wilks's head was throbbing from the hit to his head, so it took him several moments to open his eyes and adjust to the light. He felt what seemed like rope binding his wrists and ankles to a chair, the rusted metal threatening to slice his skin open. Willing his head up, Wilks took in his surroundings. Unexpectedly, the room he was currently imprisoned in wasn't so much a jail cell as a surprisingly large office of sorts. Although he suspected he was back in the Capitol Building, he didn't expect to be put up in something like this.

Hearing the door creak open, Wilks turned to inspect the new arrival. When he did, his face paled. Standing in the doorway, flanked by two Black Watch guards clad in the menacing visage of Enclave Hellfire armor and carrying tri-beam laser rifles, was the Lone Wanderer himself. The man was of average height but carried an intimidating and terrifying aura, a trait that was well-known amongst older resistance members. What looked like two Chinese Officer's Swords sat on his hip; these were no doubt Jingwei's Shocksword and Vampire's Edge, a blade combo that had won the Wanderer's fights time and time again. He wore a simple leather outfit, sunglasses hiding his eyes, and a head wrap. All in all, he looked quite unassuming by most Wastelander standards (minus the swords, of course); whether this was intentional or not, Wilks couldn't really say. The Wanderer walked towards Wilks and bent down, their eyes level with each other. The former removed his glasses, revealing unnervingly pale ice green eyes that glared at Wilks.

"So, the resistance is getting bolder, I see. Wonder what brought that on?" he said, disengaging and moving himself upright again. He motioned for everyone else to leave; unbeknownst to Wilks, the Wanderer's men knew that when he wanted the room empty save for himself and whatever unfortunate soul was at his mercy, said unfortunate soul rarely came out alive.

"Is it because you people rarely see me out anymore? Is that it? The boogeyman of the Wastes is never around, might as well be bold!" the Wanderer rambled, the last part uttered in a mocking tone dripping with contempt.

"Who's in charge now, anyway? Lyon's Pride is all gone, unless I somehow missed one. Which I highly doubt, considering I made a show of their executions and I know their loyalty to each other. Sarah, maybe? Though after I last saw her, she wasn't exactly in a condition to walk, let alone lead," the Wanderer continued rambling. In a flash, he was upon Wilks, a combat knife flush with his throat. "So, who is it, Wilks? Either I get it the hard way or the easy way. Frankly, I prefer the easy way but the choice is yours" he said, slowly removing the pressure of the knife.

"You should already know, Wanderer. Who else could possibly lead?" Wilks spat, glaring at his interrogator. The ex-vault dweller stopped pacing for a moment to think before realization crept onto his face.

"Cross? Star Paladin Cross?! Shit, I thought she died when I reduced the Citadel to ash. Didn't think she survived." he said, genuine surprise evident in his voice.

"She didn't. She was out when you betrayed us" Wilks answered, watching the Wanderer intently. The man simply chuckled.

"I didn't betray you! Honestly, I thought the legendary Brotherhood Of Steel was smarter than that. It was an alliance of convenience. Sure, it had its perks, but those pale in comparison when you can say you've conquered the unconquerable" The Wanderer splayed his arms outwards, a smug smirk on his face. Wilks's head sunk; he knew it was true. The Capital Wasteland was just that, a wasteland. Pure, unadulterated chaos and anarchy. Something that simply could not be reigned in. Yet, somehow, the man in front of him had managed to do just that. Sure, it took buckets of blood and what could have possibly classified as war crimes in the Old World to do it, but he'd still done it.

"But everything you did for us! For the wasteland! You're telling me that that was all nothing?!" Wilks asked, slight desperation in his voice. The Wanderer just looked at him.

"Ya know, this wasteland does funny things to the uninitiated, it really does. It takes the most idealistic of us and tears us down, strips everything away till it can get to your very soul. That's when shit hits the fan" the Wanderer sighed, walking past Wilks and looking down at the ancient Mall through the room's dingy window.

"The thing is though, I wasn't exactly the nicest guy to begin with. I ended up murdering my best friend's father because I had the opportunity to, let the mother of the guy who used to bully me be eaten alive by radroaches as payback. You see Wilks, I always had a pretty bad mean streak. It just took my asshole of a father abandoning me in the vault for it to come out" the man said, turning back to Wilks.

"The wasteland only made it worse. I may have had some sort of ideal once, but it's long gone now. Now that I look back on it, I realize that whatever ideals I had would have meant squat out here. There's an old saying from the Old World. 'If you can't beat them, join them'. As much as people try to resist the temptation, they always fall for it in the end. Oh well, at least I got an empire out of it" the Wanderer explained, shrugging and letting out a small laugh. Wilks just looked at the man, a look of sheer disbelief on his face. The disbelief quickly subsided, however, and was replaced by a look of sullen defeat.

"Everyone had such high hopes for you. You were supposed to be the hero we nee-." Before Wilks could continued, he shrieked in pain and surprise as he felt the blade of a knife bury itself in his leg.

"Do NOT say I was supposed to be a hero! I came out here, looking for my father for answers. I cross the entire goddamned wasteland following what barely amounts to a trail, never sure who's lying to me for their own gain or not. All the while, I'm relishing myself in freedom, TRUE freedom. Something that was denied to me in that damned vault for far too long. Then, I come to you people for help. Sure my father was an asshat, but what he was doing was admirable," the Wanderer spat, a look of rage twisted onto his face as he drove the knife deeper, causing Wilks to gasp in pain. "Yet, you bastards use me as some sort of damned symbol! Some sort of beacon to try and convince people you're the good guys! Sure, I did a few good things here and there, people called me a hero and what not. That never bothered me. It was the Brotherhood who built me up into something I never was and never will be. You and that ass Three Dog, saying I'm 'fighting the Good Fight'. Yeah, well guess what?," The Wanderer's pale icey eyes were alight with rage, a sneer plastered on his face. "Fuck. You. All." The Wanderer twisted the knife into Wilks's leg to emphasis his words; Wilks tried to remain stone-faced and not give the Wanderer the satisfaction of seeing the Brotherhood member in any more pain than he'd already showed, but it was difficult.

The 'talk' between Wilks and the Lone Wanderer went on for hours, cries of pain and pleads for mercy occasionally emanating from behind the closed doors. The guards paid no heed, however; situations such as this weren't uncommon and, with the proper application of ear plugs or something similar, could be rode out in pleasant peace and quiet.

* * *

As the ex-raider known as Jericho walked through the fortress that was the old Capitol Building, he began thinking about how he'd ended up where he had. The old man had lived a long and violent life, one much longer and more violent than the average raider. It was rare for a man his age to live such a lifestyle and come out alive, even more so to settle down relatively peacefully and not have someone gunning for their head every five minutes. Still, he had missed the action of his younger days and had occasionally considered becoming a raider again, but he wasn't as skilled as he used to be. So, he'd reluctantly accepted the mundane life of his adopted 'home', Megaton. It didn't stop him from being a gruff old bastard and all-around asshole, though.

When the future Lone Wanderer ( _just some snot-nosed kid back then_ , Jericho thought with a snort) had shown up in Megaton, Jericho had been one of the first people the kid had talked too. The kid's boasting and overall attitude had had Jericho cracking up. Sure, he'd been a brat but at least he was amusing. When the kid had mentioned that he was on his way to DC, that had given Jericho the perfect excuse to leave Megaton behind. After all, who'd look twice at some tough-looking guy escorting a kid who didn't know squat about the wasteland?

Well, that kid had certainly given Jericho one hell of a wild ride. They'd been through thick and thin together, both nearly dying several times before the other stepped in. He'd also seen the kid slowly transform into the ruthless and intelligent man he was now. The Lone Wanderer hadn't exactly been a saint in those early days, but after he'd found his father (Jericho had let the kid deal with it on his own; finding his father for answers had been his goal for months after all) the Wanderer had changed. He became much more merciless in battle and rarely did something unless it benefited his interests. When the kid had revealed the full extent of his future plans to Jericho and offered him a place as his second, the older man was all too happy to agree. He'd helped unite the more sensible raider gangs under the Wanderer's leadership and had eliminated the ones who were too troublesome to use. Once the Citadel had come down around the Brotherhood's ears, that was when the full brunt of the Wanderer's machinations struck.

So now, here he was. Second-in-command of a massive army of raiders, Brotherhood troops loyal to the Wanderer (the only exception was the Black Watch; they only took orders from the kid), and ex-Enclave who'd managed to control the very definition of anarchy in the post-war world. Sure, it'd take a hell of a long time to get everything fully up-and-running but it would all happen in time.

Jericho stopped at the massive double doors leading to the Wanderer's 'office' in the Capitol Building. He'd heard about the captured resistance spy; in fact, the information he'd given up was why he was here. Two Black Watch stood by the door, clad in Enclave Hellfire Armor; Jericho recognized the two as the kid's personal guard.

"Is he in there?" Jericho asked the men, nodding towards the door.

"Yes, sir. I have to warn you, sir, it's not pretty" the guard on the right answered, throwing up a quick salute. Jericho noticed the other guard subtlety tense at his comrade's admission. He'd seen what the Wanderer could do to prisoners in the past, but if it caused even two Black Watch members (arguably some of the toughest and most brutal sons of bitches in the Wanderer's army) to react like these two had, than whoever the poor bastard was that the kid had been 'talking to' must have pissed him off quite a bit.

"Hey, kid. You alright in here?" Jericho asked, poking his head inside and scanning the room. What he found in the center made even the veteran raider gag. A person, or what had once been a person, sat in the center of the room, tied to an old chair. The poor guy was barely recognizable, the damage to his body extensive. Jericho cringed at just how many different wounds littered the corpse. Burns from both flames and energy weapons, heavy blunt objects, deep gashes and cuts, and damage from fists. The floor around the corpse was dyed a sickly blackish-red, likely soaked into the floor permanently.

"Yeah, over here" Jericho found the Wanderer rummaging through his old Nuka-Cola fridge nearby, a bloody sledgehammer leaning against the wall nearby.

"The hell happened to the guy in the chair?" Jericho asked, tossing a thumb towards the aforementioned dead body.

"Oh, Wilks? Yeah, we caught him spying, I came in to interrogate him, he said I was supposed to be a hero. You know how it goes" the Wanderer answered, removing himself from the fridge with two bottles of beer.

"What? So you just decided to leave a battered dead body sitting in the middle of your office?" the older man answered, accepting the beer the Wanderer offered him.

The kid just chuckled to himself. "Dead body? He's not dead, just unconscious. Why do you think I keep so much adrenaline in here?"

Jericho took a swig of his beer, eyeing his boss. He'd been with the Lone Wanderer long enough for behaviour like this to not really surprise him anymore. This sort of laid-back attitude that hid a cruel, aggressive, and vindictive personality had first started to manifest after the death of the Wanderer's father but hadn't fully emerged until the fight for the Purifier. Augustus Autumn in particular had been the first victim of this new Wanderer. Jericho wondered if they'd picked all the pieces out of the purifier's bay yet.

"You better not have done all that just for shits and giggles. He coughed something up, right?" the old raider asked, an eyebrow cocked. He could hear some small groans and whimpers behind him, undoubtedly from the pseudo-human being that was currently Wilks, letting both men know that the spy was slowly (albeit painfully) waking up.

"Of course! Besides, I needed some stress relief," the Wanderer answered, grabbing the bloody sledgehammer and resting it on his shoulder while flashing Jericho a sinister grin. "Plus the guy said I was supposed to be a hero. He had it coming"

The older man winced when he heard that. He knew how much the Wanderer hated being called a hero, especially by those like the Brotherhood of Steel or Three Dog. Even Wastelanders calling the kid a hero earned his ire. The Lone Wanderer valued his freedom above all else, and being put on a pedestal and being told he was supposed to act the hero was the worst way to anger him. The Brotherhood, most recently Wilks, had learned that the hard way.

"So, you gonna tell me what you learned or what?" Jericho asked, legitimately curious about what sort of information could warrant such a brutal beating to get. Before the Wanderer could answer, a single sentence emerged from the cracked lips of a half-dead Wilks.

"W...what wou*cough*would your fa...father thin...k?" Before Jericho could stop him, the Wanderer spun around, the sledgehammer following close behind. A look of cold indifference was plastered on his face, yet flames of pure rage danced behind his icy green eyes. A sickening crack reverberated across the room, followed by a wet _thump_ as Wilk's head smacked into the wall beside him. A look of surprise registered itself on the head's face before the eyes rolled back.

"Get the Vertibirds ready. We're going hunting" the Wanderer growled, hefting the hammer back on his shoulder and marching out of the room. Jericho began following the Wanderer out, breifly casting a glance back at the mutilated, headless corpse. Shaking his head, the ex-raider jogged after the Lone Wanderer with one thought on his mind.

 _This is gonna be a bloodbath_

 ** _Yes, I made the Lone Wanderer evil for this fic. A lot of crossovers and just general Fallout fics I've read with the Lone Wanderer have written him as a relatively good character. Nothing wrong with that, but I thought I'd mix things up a bit. That, and the Capital Wasteland is a LOT more liable to corrupt someone with even relatively good goals compared to the Mojave. I tried to go with a sort of 'Handsome Jack' personality with the Wanderer (for those of you who've played Borderlands 2). Hopefully I've succeeded! Chapter 4 will be up as soon as possible._**


	4. Chapter 4

_**Finally, Chapter 4 is here! A short A/N is below. Enjoy!**_

 **Chapter 4**

" _All aircraft, approaching target. ETA, ten minutes"_

The radio of the lead Vertibird echoed through its interior as the flight of four craft flew past what was once Tenpenny Tower, now converted into yet another fortress after the Lone Wanderer's conquest. Due to the proximity of the Tower to the main line of conflict against the resistance, its fortifications was on par with the Capitol Building itself. It also had enough men and material that it could easily provide back-up if necessary.

 _Not like we'll need it_ , the Wanderer scoffed internally. The so-called 'resistance' against him was largely a joke, made up of nothing more than the few Brotherhood members left and a motley assortment of Wastelanders. Meanwhile, the men with him were some of the best the Brotherhood had had to offer (courtesy of that fool Elder Lyons) and the Enclave he'd picked weren't too shabby either. All in all, he had more than enough to deal with the resistance once and for all.

" _Sir, we're coming up on Rockland now. No sign of hostiles"_ said the pilot through the Wanderer's ear mike. The man stretched, lifted himself out of the Vertibird's bucket seat, and tapped his Pip-boy; both his swords materialized on his hips while the Perforator took form in his hands.

"Alright, kids! We're almost at the car tunnel. So far we haven't been shot at yet but don't let your guard down. It's about time we kill these bastards and get on with our lives!" The Wanderer's little speech was greeted by an assortment of whoops and hollers both from the men in front of him and from the occupants of the other three Vertibirds; the man couldn't help but chuckle a bit as he made out Jericho's scoff in all the background noise.

* * *

The Wanderer and Jericho lead the group of twenty-two men through Rockland, having found no signs of enemy forces after touchdown. The former had instructed one of the VTOL craft to re-fuel at Tenpenny Tower then fly back to support. While the Wanderer doubted they'd need such heavy firepower, it never hurt to be prepared; years in the Wasteland had taught him that after one too many close calls.

"Boss, I'm not seeing anything. You got something?" Jericho reported, scanning the dim tunnel for any signs of enemy activity, the rest of the men doing the same.

"Nothing. Where the hell are those cowards?! You'd think they'd actually come out and face me. We weren't exactly subtle on the way here" answered the Wanderer, kicking a stray tin can. He'd made sure to make it as clear as possible what his plans were, making sure to broadcast his little field trip on all known radio channels used by the resistance, even adding relatively unused ones just in case. After the interrogation of Wilks, he was more pissed off than he'd been in a while. He'd solved that in the past by just going out and killing things. Even though he ran a pseudo-nation now, he saw no reason why his little coping tactic wouldn't work just as good now as it had worked in the past. Besides, what better thing to shoot up than the group that's at least partially responsible for your anger in the first place? The least they could do was make it easy for him.

"Come on. It's clear they're not here. The satellite array isn't far. Let's move!" the Wanderer said, rushing down the side passage leading to their destination. While the rest of the Wanderer's men loyally followed, Jericho was hesitant. He couldn't get the sense of foreboding that lurked in the back of his mind out of his head. While at one point he would have ignored it, decades in the wasteland both on his own and with the Wanderer ( _especially_ with the Wanderer) had taught him to listen to that little feeling every chance he got. And right now it was blaring uncontrollably.

 _Today is not gonna end well_ , Jericho thought as he trudged off to join his friend and boss.

"Spread out! I don't want to be caught in a potential cross fire!" the Wanderer ordered as he entered the rocky, cliff-lined valley leading up to the array's imposing facade. He remembered well what assaulting this place was like the first time (and couldn't help but laugh internally at the irony of Brotherhood members using an old Enclave base as a hideout); Enclave troops had torn the first wave of assaulters apart with nothing more than a few men and some well-placed mines. There was no doubt in the Wanderer's mind that the Brotherhood wouldn't hesitate to use the same tactics of the Enclave if it meant they could get the drop on the Wanderer.

As they advanced through the valley, both Jericho and the Wanderer began to notice what seemed like signs of fighting. These signs looked much newer than some of the still-remaining remnants of the previous fight between the Brotherhood and the Enclave, a fight that seemed like a lifetime ago to the Wanderer and Jericho.

"Boss, you seeing the same things I'm seeing?" came the synthesized voice of Jericho through the former vault dweller's headset.

"Yeah, empty MF canisters and shell casings, scratch marks, blood. Something definitely went down here" answered the Wanderer, stopping to examine the claw marks. He cocked his eyebrow as he inspected the markings. They were set at around the same height as that of a Deathclaw, although instead of three claws like the latter, whatever had made these marks instead had a total of five. The depth was also much shallower than what he'd seen a Deathclaw make, although both the intensity of them and the fact that many more markings lined the cliff wall meant that the unknown creature had actually been _more vicious_ than the everyday Deathclaw, something that made even the Wanderer stop and pray he wouldn't run into the mystery creature.

"Sir, over here! We've got something!" The Wanderer was snapped out of his inspection by the call of one of his men. Following the voices, he found the man and Jericho inspecting some sort of debris from the battle here.

"The hell is this?" said Jericho, lifting up the object into full view for the other two men. In his hand was a standard-issue Brotherhood power helmet, or what was left of one. The headgear was battered and scratched, with what seemed like bite marks covering a few areas. One of the breathing tubes was completely destroyed, what little remained hanging off of the front of the helmet. Both eye pieces were shattered, no small feat considering they were supposed to be shatter-proof (at least, the Wanderer THOUGHT they were shatterproof; he never really bothered to check). Most disturbing of all, the entire inside of the helmet was drenched in blood.

"That, Jericho my friend, is evidence that the Brotherhood remnants here are no longer our main problem" the Wanderer stated matter-of-factly as he withdrew a radio from one of the pockets of the old prewar general's uniform he currently wore.

"All troops, listen up. There's something, or somethings, here that MAY have already slaughtered our original objective. Keep your heads up and eyes sharp. This valley is the perfect place for an ambush. Don't let yourselves get caught in one" the Wanderer ordered, receiving an assortment of affirmatives in response. The men he'd brought were all experienced veterans of the Wasteland and had faced whatever DC had thrown at them. Yet he didn't want them to get too cocky. The Lone Wanderer had seen too many fools die because they were overconfident and thought nothing could touch them (hell, _he'd_ been one of those fools when he'd first left the vault; he knew firsthand how dangerous such feelings could be).

"Come on, the main building shouldn't be much farther. All the others know what to do and where to go, no sense in staying out here any longer than necessary. Plus, we might find answers inside the relay station" As the three men left, the Wanderer couldn't help but look back at the destroyed helmet. Something unbelievably bad had happened here, he felt, something that had ripped through the resistance based here. He sighed as he finished his thoughts. _Like always, I have to clean up the mess_.

The Wanderer and Jericho had found the the old station in much the same state they'd last seen it in, complete with craters from the Hercules IX missiles and bits of leftovers from Liberty Prime. What was new, however, was yet more evidence of some sort of recent fight. The strike team actually had bodies to go on now, although the state of of said bodies was questionable at best. Very few were completely intact, with most missing limbs or chunks from their bodies.

"Well, this explains where all the resistance members went" said the Wanderer nonchalantly, stepping over numerous corpses in his path and fleecing the few that still looked like they had something to give up. On closer inspection, most of the bodies looked like they'd been crushed inside their armor or ripped apart. Connecting the state of the bodies, the destroyed Brotherhood helmet, and the claw marks on the rocks back in the valley, it was clear that the Wanderer and his men weren't dealing with a human.

 _No shit, genius! Should've clued into that with the claws and helmet! Sure as hell ain't no Deathclaw though. One, the tower would've notified me immediately of this and two, the Brotherhood are MORE than capable of dealing with Deathclaws. So what the hell caused this?_

As he continued to sift through some of the bodies, the ex-vault dweller realized that some of these men and women were familiar, people he'd met during his past travels. He recognized Stockholm, the former gate guard of Megaton, lying by a rock, his head and one of his arms close by. Paladin Tristan sat upright near the valley wall, a laser pistol in his hands and the front of his armour crushed. The Wanderer even saw Paladin Jensen, who'd apparently escaped from Fort Bannister when the resistance had launched an assault on the fort. He'd always wondered where he ended up.

"Boss, we found a radio! Still active!" yelled Jericho, who was crouched next to the mangled body of what likely was once a comms officer, judging by the remains of his uniform and the aforementioned radio set on his back. Sure enough, the Wanderer could what sounded like garbled speech coming from the headset in Jericho's hands.

" _Thi...Opera...cer Edwards. To any resist...requesting immediate as...errun by Proj...shadow subjects. M...dead, only Cross, me, and...please hel...s!"_ The message continued, suggesting to both Jericho and the Wanderer that it wasn't so much an attempt to contact the deceased comms soldier but more likely the equipment picking up an emergency transmission. Both men looked at each other, their faces displaying no emotion but their eyes telling plenty.

"Alright, I want four men out here in concealed positions, in case any more resistance shows up! I want ten of you call the Vertibird and get to the tower, clearly whatever did this ended up doing most of the work so it's better to operate in small teams. The other ten are split between Jericho and I, five with me and five with him! Got it?" the Wanderer ordered, getting everyone's attention. Although there were some murmurs of irritation about being told to go back, the ordered ten did as they were told. As the others began organizing themselves and checking their equipment, the Wanderer pulled Jericho aside.

"I want you to find the data store in there. I know there is one cause I've seen it myself last time I was here. Find everything you can about this project. These idiots were in way over their heads, and that foolish bitch Cross decided to dabble in something that she clearly shouldn't have. I don't know if the things that did this to these men are dead or if some escaped, but I'll be damned if I let them or whatever data Cross has get out into the Wasteland" the Wanderer ordered angrily. Jericho could see the rage dancing behind the man's eyes. The old raider knew he didn't care what happened to the resistance members, or even his own men if push came to shove, all he wanted was to know what the ex-Star Paladin had done. The one thing that worried Jericho, however, was what would happen once the Wanderer got his hands on whatever they were running in the relay station. If it was as deadly as it seemed, Jericho doubted that the Wanderer could resist the temptation to use it or them, whatever it was that this project had created. As the Wanderer gave out orders to his men, Jericho began debating on a choice he'd dwelled on for a long time.

As the Wanderer, Jericho, and their men entered the station (the Wanderer was surprised that no one even TRIED to patch up the hole made by Liberty Prime during the Brotherhood assault), they found it strange that there weren't as many bodies inside as there were out. It was clear that the men outside had died during a 'last stand' of sorts, yet there was almost no physical evidence of the casualties that would have been inflicted in an evacuation that would have necessitated such an action, aside from a few scorch marks and bullet holes, along with some empty energy weapon cells and bullet casings. Both the Wanderer and Jericho subconsciously noticed the bloody drag marks leading deeper into the facility out of the corner of their eyes.

"Alright, Jericho, you and your men are to proceed to the data bank. I'm sending the data to your Pip-boy now. I have the frequency for that distress signal locked in, so my men and I will follow it and hopefully find both Cross and whatever the hell caused this. Contact me if anything comes up" the Wanderer said, making sure everyone knew what they had to do while he tapped away on his own Pip-boy. Jericho's model beeped, indicating a successful transfer. Due to the old raider's place in the Wanderer's 'government', it was found necessary that the Wanderer would need to easily contact his second-in-command should the need arise. Thanks to the numerous vaults littered throughout the DC area, it wasn't that hard to scrounge up a Pip-boy. A few small adjustments here and there and, voila, Jericho's very own Vault-Tec Pip-boy 3000.

"Boss, you want me to radio you just in case we run into whatever the hell made those resistance guys their scratching post?" Jericho asked, double-checking the map and handing out his personal frequency to his five men (who had standard pre-war radios looted from Adams Air Force Base).

"If it's too much for you guys to handle, fall back to a more defensible position then contact me. Whatever creatures got loose here are strong enough to crush power armor and rip limbs apart. In case any of you are wondering, no, I don't think it's a Deathclaw. I doubt Cross would be stupid enough to repeat the Enclave's little experiments with remote-control ones," That elicited some cringes and sheepish looks from some of the ex-Enclave among them; apparently only the highest echelons of Enclave High Command had thought it was brilliant, much to the detriment of their men on the ground. "Along with the fact that we would have seen Deathclaw bodies. The things are deadly, but with this much heavy ordinance in one place means that at least a few would have been taken down" the Wanderer finished, performing an ammo check on his Perforator as he did so.

 _That and the fact that those claws and teeth marks were too small for one of those scaly bastards, not to mention they looked way more aggressive._

"Alright, if we're all clear about what we need to do, this is where we part ways" said the Wanderer. As both groups parted ways to their respective objectives, the Wanderer and Jericho both stopped and wished each other luck on last time. As the Lone Wanderer trailed after his men, he couldn't help but think about the sad smile and depressed gleam in Jericho's eyes as they'd parted ways.

 _Eh, probably just Jericho being a mopey asshole like always_ , thought the Wanderer as he began his long-awaited hunt.

 _ **A/N: Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter! To be honest, I didn't really like how this came out as it felt kind of awkward to write but I'll let the readers be the judge of that. Also, I apologize for how long its taking to get to what would actually make this a crossover. I do actually have a chapter plan, but it involves a bit of build-up and backstory (which I know not everyone enjoys) although I hope you guys enjoy reading this as much as I enjoy writing it.**_

 _ **Also wanted to thank everyone whos favorited and followed this fanfic. Tale Of Two Legends has done SO much better than I thought it would when I posted the first chapter. Knowing that people actually enjoy reading my work is a huge plus for me and I'm always happy to provide!**_

 _ **Chapter 5 will be up as soon as possible, even with university papers and all that grabbing my attention. Stay tuned!**_

 _ **Vorandul**_


	5. Chapter 5

**_Chapter 5 is finally here! I am deeply sorry for how long its taking between uploads, but I hope you're all enjoying Tale Of Two Legends! After this chapter, we can finally get to what actually makes this crossover a crossover. But enough about that. Enjoy!_**

 **Chapter 5**

As Jericho and his men walked through the lower levels of the relay station, the old raider began to contemplate just how big the place really was. Sure, he'd been hear with the Wanderer during the Brotherhood assault, but that had only involved a small fraction of the facility. Although Jericho wondered exactly HOW the kid knew where this databank was, he wasn't overly surprised anyway. The Lone Wanderer was well-known for both his perception and his exploration skills across the Wasteland; the full charting of Rockopolis was probably one of his greatest achievements.

"Hey, Jericho. When are we gonna find this damned room the boss wants so badly anyway? We've been down here for over an hour!" one of Jericho's men, an old raider pal named Vox, asked; it'd been about the fifth time he'd asked such a question in the last twenty minutes or so. As much as it irritated him, Jericho could see why Vox was getting so annoyed. The Wanderer had never bothered to share with the older man how big the satellite relay station truly was, a mistake that was now costing both time and energy that could have been put to better use (in Jericho's opinion anyway).

"Stop complaining, Vox. Christ, we'll get there when we get there alright?" Jericho answered, irritation clear in his voice. Much to the delight of the other four men under Jericho's command, this routine continued despite numerous statements that Jericho would shove his foot up Vox's unmentionables. By the tenth time, Jericho realized that he was almost like one of those dads in an old pre-war holotape sitcom. Good God, did he ever hate those things.

After almost two and a half hours of searching, the six man group finally found what they were looking for.

"Fucking finally! Let's get this shit and get out of here" Vox shouted happily, jogging up to the blast door and turning the rusty wheel. As the door opened, the man jumped back in terror as the upper half of a resistance member slumped forward, the barely attached head threatening to free itself.

"Fuck! Fucking Christ that scared the shit out of me!" Vox said, leaning against one of the adjacent walls with a hand over his heart, as if to stop it from jumping out of his chest.

"What's the matter, can't handle some blood and gore?" Jericho joked, causing his friend to flip him the bird. The older man laughed as he and the rest of his men sidestepped the body, Vox trailing last. Inside the room wasn't much better, however. The lower half of a torso, presumably from the unfortunate bastard at the door, was a few feet away; Jericho had to look away once he noticed that said lower half was completely empty and devoid of organs. Another body, in much better shape than the first, was slumped over a large desk-mounted terminal in the center of the room. Ordering his men to spread out, Jericho approached the body and pulled it away from the terminal. As he began booting up the machine, he tried to push the fact that said corpse was a teen girl and that her head was missing out of his mind. The terminal booted up with an electronic _ping_ , the terminal's login screen greeting Jericho soon after. A quick hack (Jericho mentally thanked the Wanderer for teaching the man the skill) and he was in. Many of the files appeared to be just menial journal entries and notes (possibly belonging to the man by the door or the girl) but one tab did catch his eye, _Operation Killshadow_. Selecting the file brought up a massive amount of secondary tabs, ranging from what looked like a operational summary to project notes to emails. Selecting the summary, a wall of text appeared in front of Jericho. As he read, his eyes nearly bugged out of his head:

OPERATION KILLSHADOW SUMMARY

WARNING: AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY OR WITH EXPRESS PERMISSION FROM STAR PALADIN CROSS

UNAUTHORIZED USERS WILL BE PUNISHED

OPERATION KILLSHADOW WILL UTILIZE SPECIMENS, SUBJECT CODENAME SHADOW DOGS, PULLED FROM ENCLAVE ASSET, DUBBED GATE, TO INFILTRATE AND LIQUIDATE HIGH-RANKING PERSONS OF INTEREST KNOWN TO INTERACT OR DIRECTLY CO-OPERATE WITH SUBJECT BROKEN BLADE. BROKEN BLADE IS TO BE DEALT WITH LAST THROUGH COMBINED ASSAULT OF SHADOW DOG SUBJECTS AND FRIENDLY FORCES. PLEASE SEE FILE 1-A FOR TARGET LIST. FURTHER INFORMATION ON OPERATION KILLSHADOW SPECIMENS UNDER FILE 2-A THROUGH 2-B

"So this is their endgame" Jericho mumbled to himself as he selected the aforementioned files. He'd suspected for a long time that Cross and her resistance were gearing up for something big, due to all the raids on arms shipments coming from Canterbury Commons and The Pitt but he hadn't realized they would try something like this. Everyone knew a direct assault on the Wanderer's fortress that was the Capitol Building was virtually suicide, but if one were to dismantle the Wanderer's (arguably fragile) power base, they could have a chance of success against the man himself.

 _Crazy bastards_ , Jericho thought as he looked over the resistance targets. There were definitely some big names inside, including his own, the Lord Of The Pitt Ashur's, and even the eastern commander of the Wanderer's forces, the raider known as Smiling Jack (who Jericho had loathed to admit was an extremely competent commander and was cut from much different cloth compared to other raider leaders). Their importance were matched by the difficulty of actually _getting_ to them. Jericho noted that almost every target was surrounded by a veritable army of armed guards. So what in the hell had the resistance pulled out of this so-called 'Gate' that would render said protection useless? Accessing the last two file mentioned, the information inside shed further light on what exactly had happened to the occupants of the satellite relay facility:

SUBJECT INVENTORY LIST

PLEASE CONTACT DR. INVERNESS FOR INQUIRIES

'SHADOW DOGS'

QUANTITY: 50

STATUS: UNKNOWN

OBSERVATIONS: WEAKEST OF SUBJECTS, INCREASED AGGRESSIVENESS DURING TESTING AND EXPERIMENTATION, INCREDIBLY AGILE, RECOMMEND INCREASED SECURITY DETAIL IN CONTAINMENT FACILITY

'BLACK BEARS'

QUANTITY: 15

STATUS: UNKNOWN

OBSERVATIONS: INCREDIBLY STRONG BUT SLOW, ATTITUDE AND RESULTS FROM TESTING SHOW UNSATISFACTORY USE FOR OPERATION KILLSHADOW, RECOMMEND FURTHER EXPERIMENTS AND STUDY

'HELL SERPENT'

QUANTITY: 1

STATUS: INSIDE GATE CHAMBER! ADVISE CONTAINMENT IMMEDIATELY!

OBSERVATIONS: TWIN HEADS OPERATE INDEPENDENTLY YET IN TANDEM, NOTED TO BECOME INERT AFTER LARGE MEAL, UNABLE TO DIGEST ARTIFICIAL SUBSTANCES, INCREDIBLY DANGEROUS, RECOMMEND ISOLATION

STATUS OF CONTAINMENT CENTER: ALL CELLS BREACHED. RECOMMEND CAPTURE AND/OR LIQUIDATION PROTOCOLS

Realizing the sheer amount of information left to read, Jericho copied everything to a holotape. Before logging off, he made sure to delete every piece of information on the terminal.

 _Can't let shit like this get out of here_ , Jericho thought as he moved to round up his men. He couldn't help but stop and look at the girl's corpse. It was clear Cross and her cronies had grown desperate to topple the Lone Wanderer and had jumped on the opportunity to end him once and for all with whatever these creatures were. Only thing that bitch had got in return, however, were dozens of wasted and innocent lives. That thought made the idea of finally capturing her all the sweeter.

"Hey boss, got the information you wanted. Where are you?" Jericho said into his radio. There was a several second delay before the Wanderer's voice came through. It was most definitely not a calm voice.

" _We're near some sort of operations room! We got fucking ambushed by whatever the hell Cross kept here. Managed to kill a few but there's too many! Fuck, Robert watch out! Get your ass over here and help! Come on, fuckers! Come get me!"_ Sounds of gunfire, shouts, roars, and screams flooded through the radio, with the last sound being the Wanderer's (unnervingly) joy-filled cackling before the feed cut. Jericho blanched as he went over the message in his head.

 _Operations room? Oh fuck, that better not be what I think it is!_

"Come on, move it! The boss is in trouble!" Jericho shouted as he took off down the corridor, leaving his bewildered men in the dust. The old raider just prayed that the kid would still be alive by the time he got there.

* * *

Although the Wanderer had been in plenty of vicious fights with all manner of creatures (the trek through Vault 87 was of particular note), the current run-and-gun he and his men found themselves in certainly ranked near the top of what was quite a long list. The search had begun easy enough; the entire facility was quiet save for the occasional groan of metal or click of machinery. They had found more signs of fighting as they'd continued exploring, an occasional bloodstain here or a severed limb there. Eventually, they'd stumbled onto what turned out to be Cross's private office. The Wanderer had immediately ordered the place torn apart for any sign of Cross's whereabouts. As his men tossed the room, he'd hacked into the ex-Star Paladin's personal terminal to see if she'd left any clues on there. Sure enough, Cross had managed to leave a message indicating that she'd fled to something called the 'Gate Room'. Even better, she'd left a map (either the Wanderer's luck was really that good or Cross was really that stupid; he wasn't sure which). Before they'd left to track down the survivors, the ex-vault dweller had made sure to torch the room out of spite and (although he'd never really admit this to anyone) just for kicks. As they'd continued, the group had run into the first physical evidence of what the hell had caused all the carnage. The creature was like nothing the Wanderer had ever seen before. It was slightly taller then him, with pitch-black fur and glowing red eyes. The mask that covered the thing's face had aroused the Wanderer's curiosity. Which he'd promptly sated once he discovered that no, a solid mask made potentially out of bone cannot stop a sword which discharges 12,000 volts with every activation swung by one of the most psychopathic individuals in the entire Wasteland. That little action had now led to the group's current predicament, being swarmed by more of those things, who were clearly pissed at his little experiment. Not that he minded, of course. It just meant that he now had plenty of shit to kill.

"For the love of God, where did all you bastards come from?!" the Wanderer yelled has he emptied yet another Perforator clip into the snarling mass of black fur and red eyes that were currently bearing down on him and the rest of his group. On second thought, the Wanderer realized that he didn't so much have a group left as one guy whose arm was too torn up to fight. Glancing at his Pip-boy, he saw that he was somehow surprisingly close to his intended destination. In fact, if his map was right, it was actually right around the corner.

 _Perfect_ , the Wanderer thought with a sinister grin.

"Hurry up, we're almost there!" he called to his last subordinate, both speeding down the hall and making the right turn. Sure enough, there was a door labelled 'Operations Room', although the former word was scratched out and replaced by the word 'Gate'. Bounding towards the door, the Wanderer gripped the bulkhead wheel and began to pull. The man behind him bent to catch his breath, trying to ignore the nightmarish noise behind him. When he looked up, however, his sense of relief was replaced by one of horror as he was met by the barrel of the Wanderer's gun.

"Thanks for the sacrifice. You'll be remembered" said the Wanderer in a not very convincing tone of voice. With one pull of the trigger, half the magazine was emptied into the poor man's leg, followed swiftly by a donkey kick to the stomach, sending the soldier right towards their hungry pursuers. As the Wanderer finally got the bulkhead open, he couldn't help but smirk at the poor man's screams of pain and terror.

 _Been to long since I got to do that. Besides, better him than me. Rather not end up dead by monster_ he thought, walking into the room and slamming the door shut. As if on cue, the Wanderer heard the unmistakable sound of energy weapons charging up.

"Was wondering where the hell you people went. Having a pest problem, are you?" he announced, slowly turning to the room's occupants. Sure enough, his goal stood before him.

Cross glared at the Wanderer from behind her wall of guards, a hand on her laser pistol and the other holding back what the Wanderer recognized as a very familiar face.

"Well shit, is that Maxson behind you? Arthur Maxson? Thought the little shit died at the Citadel" he said, a strange grin on his face. His statement only made Cross and her guards tense up more.

"The Lone Wanderer. Tyrannical ruler of the Wasteland and the Brotherhood's greatest failure. You had so much potential, yet you chose to betray us and everything you stood for. Now look at what's happened. Sitting in the fortress of our mutual enemy with monsters at your back" exclaimed Cross, a look of anger and sorrow dancing across her eyes and face. The Wanderer couldn't help but roll his eyes.

"Oh please! When are you people gonna get it through your skulls that I never actually joined the Brotherhood? You all just assumed I was one of you and shared the same beliefs after I fought alongside the Brotherhood a couple times. News flash, Cross! We had mutual interests. The Enclave were a threat and the Purifier was needed if the Wasteland was to survive. Thing is, I handled both way better than any of you could" he said, irritation in his voice.

"Besides, that fool Lyons gave me the tools I needed to take control. I won the loyalty of the men he gave me to command. I won the loyalty of and saved the Enclave leftovers that he ordered destroyed. I continued my father's work with the purifier, something the scribes weren't able to. I've brought stability to the Wasteland. Sure, I had to break a few eggs and kill a few hundred people, but you know what?" the Wanderer declared, beginning to move forwards. The tension in the air could be cut with a knife.

The Wanderer stopped within feet of Cross's makeshift defensive line, the glare between the two lighting up the whole room. In one swift motion, he drew Vampire's Edge and Jingwei's Shocksword, activating both. Twelve thousand volts of electricity coursed through the latter, while the mysterious supernatural energies of the former gave it an unearthly red glow.

"I had the balls to seize the day. I took what I little I had and gained so much more, gained what I could never dream of having back in the vault. What I've done doesn't compare to what I've achieved. Besides," the Wanderer paused, adopting the fighting stance that had ended so many of Cross's friends and comrades. Both Cross and her men paled; they'd seen his prowess on the battlefield from both sides. They knew at that moment they would not leave the room alive.

"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, after all" In a whirlwind of red, blue, and dark green, the Wanderer descended on the last remnants of the resistance to his rule.

* * *

"Shit, Cross. Didn't think you still had that much fight left in you"

An out-of-breath but victorious Wanderer stood over the broken body of ex-Star Paladin Cross, who glared up at the man through the one eye she had left. The bits and pieces of what was once her guard littered the room while the body of Arthur Maxson, impaled by Vampire's Edge, sat slumped by the wall. As loathe as the Wanderer was to admit it, he wasn't kidding. Cross and, to a lesser extent Maxson, had both given him a hell of a battle. While he had predicted that Cross would whip out her famous Super Sledge once he'd finished splattering the last of her guards all over the room, what he hadn't accounted for was Arthur Maxson, a kid who he remembered as terrified of his own goddamned shadow, whipping out a pair of power fists and try to gut him. It had been painfully obvious that the kid wasn't even close to having the experience to use the things, but the Wanderer couldn't help but admire Maxson's determination out of pity for him. Of course, it hadn't stopped him from running the young heir through with one of his blades.

"Face your death with dignity. You're a Maxson for god sakes, act like it! At least take comfort in the fact that you'll be a martyr after this" the Wanderer had told the young man once he'd noticed the kid had soiled himself and had started tearing up. He would have given him a quick death if Cross hadn't angrily charged him swinging her damn hammer like a common raider. Still, the idea that he'd eliminated the heir to the Brotherhood throne had made him uncharacteristically giddy.

"The Lone Wanderer, the man who ended the Maxson line that dates back two centuries. An impressive notch in my list of achievements, don't you think Cross?" he'd asked her. Not only did the statement taste sweet in his mouth and sound like music to his ears, but it also succeed in pissing Cross off, forgetting on of the most vital rules about close combat: always keep a clear head. Her anger only made her more mistake-prone, something the Wanderer capitalized on with zeal. Now, she was lying on the floor defeated, her sledgehammer embedded in one of the walls, the Wanderer standing over her in final beautiful victory.

"You're a fool, Wanderer. You honestly think your brand of 'government' will stabilize the Wasteland? Make it peaceful? Have you learned nothing since your time outside the vault? All you've done is set up DC to become an even worse hellhole than it already was" Cross spat, flecks of blood hitting the floor in front of her. The Wanderer simply laughed.

"If they don't want peace, then I'll MAKE them want it. They won't have much choice. It's either they co-operate and let me sort out the rest, or they die. Simple as that" explained the Wanderer, complementing it with a sneer.

"Besides, with the weapon you have here, that'll be more than achievable" Cross's eyes went wide in horror at the revelation of the Wanderer's plans and the thought of what would happen.

"YOU BASTARD! Have you not seen what my own desperation caused here?! My men, eaten alive or torn apart all so I could finally get my revenge. Yet, you want to use such a thing against the Wasteland? You're mad!" Cross screamed at him, fear and terror lacing her voice. She couldn't even begin to truly imagine the devastation unleashing the creatures of Operation Killshadow would cause.

The Wanderer leaned in close and glared at her. "Here's the thing, I am most definitely mad. But, I have what I need to improve on your designs and experiments. I'll succeed where you failed"

Cross's dark brown eyes stared into his ice-green ones. She knew he wasn't bluffing, he'd proved that with the execution of the last Lyon's Pride members and what he'd done to Sarah. She could see the crazed yet methodical madness in his eyes, the calculated insanity of a man who stopped at nothing to achieve his goals and let nothing get in his way. It was at that moment that she decided on what would be the last action of her life.

Before the Wanderer could react, Cross slammed her hand onto a button on a console beside the Gate. It didn't take the Wanderer much time to figure out what said button did. With a loud _whoosh_ and a rush of air, the Gate's ring shone brightly, causing both Cross and the Wanderer to shield their eyes. With an electronic buzz, the light died down, leaving a swirling bluish-white disk taking up the whole of the device's frame. Everything seemed normal, except for the quiet whine that emitted from the disk itself. Looking at the Gate then at Cross then back again, the Lone Wanderer simply scoffed.

"Nice trick. Assuming you got those creatures through here, you just made my job a LOT easier. Stupid bitch..." the Wanderer said, shaking his head as he turned his eyes back to Cross, who had a strange, almost imperceptible smirk ghosting across her lips.

"So, any last words befo-" he began, only to be interrupted by Cross's sudden insane laughter. Not many things unnerved him, but laughter like that did. He'd heard it before, from those that were insane, their minds shattered with no prospect of recovery. He realized he had begun to almost pity the woman. Key word was _almost_.

"AHAHAHAHA! YOU WON'T LEAVE HERE ALIVE, WANDERER! I'VE WON! I KILLED THE WANDERER, I KILLED HIM! AHAHAHA! THE SON OF JAMES IS DEAD! THE FALLEN HERO DIES TOD-" Cross was interrupted by the Wanderer, only instead of his own laughter, Cross's interruption was provided by the cold steel of Jingwei's Shocksword running through her mouth and exiting the back of her throat. For extra overkill, 12,000 volts of electricity discharged through the specially crafted weapon, frying the inside of Cross's mouth and causing subtle wisps of smoke to begin trailing out of her ears as her brain was overloaded and boiled in her skull. All the while, the Lone Wanderer stood over the last commander of the Brotherhood, his cold pale green eyes bearing down on the twitching, spasmodic corpse; behind his blank expression the Wanderer's legendary rage burned, the hatred for the group that had ruined his life so great that, as the electricity died down and Cross's skull combusted, it was if those flames had caused it.

"Shut up and die, Cross. I was never a hero and never will be. Hope you enjoy burning in hell" the Wanderer said in a frigidly monotonous tone as he withdrew the shocksword and went to retrieve Vampire's Edge. As he withdrew the weapon and inspected it, he heard a loud _thump_ behind him, like the sound of a large mass hitting the floor. Slowly turning to meet this potential threat, the Wanderer did nothing but roll his eyes and sigh in exasperation.

"You have GOT to be fucking kidding me" A doubled hiss was the only response to his outburst.

* * *

As Jericho finished off the last of the canine creatures that had been prowling around the entrance to the operations center, he inspected the carnage before him. The remains of what must have been human (at least, Jericho THOUGHT it was a human; there wasn't much left as an identifier) sat several feet from the door.

 _One of the kid's men maybe?_ Jericho thought as he motioned his men to cover the door. He'd noticed the creatures dissolve into a mixture of black smoke and a fine ash-like substance that seemed to evaporate into thin air. To his astonishment, not even the bones were left where the creatures once lay.

 _What the fuck are these things? Fuck was Cross doing down here?_ He mused. Despite not seeing any evidence of the ash by-product from the creatures, Jericho wasn't taking any chances. One order later, the faces of him and his men were covered by a variety of rags and old gas masks.

"Boss, I'm hearing fighting in there!" Vox told Jericho, his voice muffled by his mask. As he neared the door, he could hear what Vox was talking about. A cacophony of grunts and hisses, with the occasional sound of electricity hitting flesh, sounded through the door.

"What in the fuck is going on?" mumbled Jericho under his breath as he readied his Chinese Assault Rifle. He glanced back behind him, silently ordering his men to do the same.

 _3...2...1!_ , he counted mentally before throwing the bulkhead open. What met him on the other side made his jaw drop.

* * *

"What are you waiting for?! Shoot it!" the Wanderer yelled as he watched Jericho and his men file into the room. He swung at the beast with his shocksword, confirmation of a hit taking the form of a sizzling noise as the electrified blade met skin. The two-headed snake hissed in pain but kept coming. The Wanderer began slowly backing up towards the Gate Cross had activated; worryingly, he noted that the whining noise the device had emitted upon activation had steadily transformed into an ear-splitting mixture of groaning metal, rushing wind, and an inhuman shriek.

 _Why the fuck isn't Jericho shooting?!_ , thought the Wanderer has he deflected another lunge from the creature's white head with Vampire's Edge. He was much more cautious than he usually was; the creature could easily overwhelm him using both its massive heads at once and the thing probably knew that too. Maybe it was just playing with him? Like a Molerat plays with its food before devouring it?

With still no response from Jericho, the Wanderer's apprehension quickly transformed into anger.

"JERICHO! FUCKING SHOO-" His demand was interrupted by a muffled explosion behind him. Before he could react, however, he felt himself being yanked back by a rushing vacuum of air being emitted from the overloaded Gate behind him. Jamming his swords into the ground (how they didn't snap in half was a miracle unto itself), the ex-vault dweller fully realized just why Cross had activated the machine.

 _She intended to do this! She set it to overload beforehand, activated it at the last second, and then goaded me into killing her so I couldn't make her deactivate it! She probably put this goddamned snake in here to keep me occupied too!_ He had to admit, if he wasn't currently holding on for dear life with that god awful snake monster bearing down on him courtesy of the vortex, he would have actually laughed at how easily he'd been played. Of course, he would have then mutilated Cross's corpse in anger afterwards but that was neither here nor there. Using his blades as makeshift spikes, he barely dodged the careening form of the two-headed reptile as it disappeared through the portal, an angry and confused-sounding hiss preceding it. As he began slowly moving towards the door and Jericho, he heard the unmistakable sound of a bolt being racked; even among the noise of the vacuum and the groaning metal of the control room, it was distinctive. The Wanderer craned his head towards the source, finding himself staring down the barrel of Jericho's Chinese Assault Rifle. The ex-raider was alone, his foot wrapped around a section of exposed piping to hold himself steady. What struck the Wanderer the most, however, was the sorrowful look in the older man's eyes.

"Thanks for the help, old man" the Wanderer said neutrally, his knuckles turning white from tightening his grip on his blades.

"Sorry, kid. I can't let you use Cross's research. You've seen what it can do to a highly-trained military force with plenty of experience. Imagine what it'd do to regular civvies" Jericho answered, his grip shifting on his gun. The Wanderer's neutral expression rapidly shifted, first to one of regret then to a look of rage and betrayal.

"What're you gonna do once I'm gone than, huh? You know damn well that I'm the only one that can hold what we've built together. Once I'm dead, everything'll fall apart. Hell, it'd be worse than before!" he said angrily, his legendary anger building behind his eyes. Jericho knew the Wanderer was right however; he'd ruled the Capital Wasteland through intimidation, fear, and respect, not to mention the fact that many Wastelanders actually supported him despite everything the Wanderer had done. Still, Jericho would not relent.

"You may hold the whole house of cards together, but we'll manage. This is the Wasteland, remember? Humanity has come this far after two centuries in such shitty conditions, we can manage just fine. Besides, what is that saying you like? 'The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few'?" Jericho stated, standing his ground. By the look in his eyes, the old raider knew that he'd got to the Wanderer, but he was a ticking time bomb. A cornered animal was a dangerous one and the Wanderer was the most dangerous of all.

"Fuck you, Jericho. You better hope that wherever that thing sends me, I can't get to you. I WILL come for you. No one takes what's mine and LIVES!" the Wanderer screamed, leaping at his old friend with both of his blades poised to strike. Jericho let loose with his rifle's entire magazine, most of it striking the Wanderer dead center. The latter was tossed back, the vacuum pulling him in. The ex-vault dweller's grip on his blades loosened, Jericho watching as they both flew through the blueish-white vortex. The Wanderer soon followed, grabbing the edge of the device's frame but not before half his body was already submerged.

"I WILL COME BACK, JERICHO! NO MATTER HOW LONG IT TAKES OR WHERE I GO, I WILL FIND YOU! YOU'RE A DEAD MAN! NO ONE TAKES WHATS MINE AND LIVES!" he screamed, his face twisted filled with more rage than Jericho had ever seen from him. The metal groaned against the Wanderer's struggle as he tried to pull himself out, his fury alone giving him strength. To Jericho's horror, it almost looked like he'd succeed…until that section of the frame gave out.

"RAAAAAAGGGGHHHH!" the man screamed defiantly as he disappeared into the void, his voice fading as his scream echoed throughout the room.

Relieved that it was over, Jericho leveled his rifle at the portal's control panel and fired. Sparks and crackles of electricity erupted as the rounds tore through the delicate device, a loud _woomph_ following soon after as the vortex closed. Unwrapping himself from the pipe (and thanking God that he hadn't broken his leg), the man took one last solemn look back at the device he'd sent one of his oldest friends through. He sighed as he left the room, shutting the bulkhead door as he did so. Jericho allowed himself one more moment of mourning before steeling himself and burying his regret. He'd need to be strong for the coming days ahead. How he handled them could potentially change the Wasteland for the better or worse. Jericho prayed that he would be so lucky.

* * *

As Jericho exited the Satellite Array and re-grouped with the remaining men, he failed to notice the shimmering outline of four figures watching them from the facility's roof. The sun had fallen behind the horizon, plunging the already dim valley into near total darkness. The four watchers used this to their full advantage as they uncloaked, their jet black armor adding further camouflage.

"Simon, get me Command" the leader of the group ordered, his position reinforced by the outline of a single yellow bar on the right shoulder of his armor. His subordinate keyed in the frequency, a hiss of static filtering through the second lieutenant's helmet as the connection was established.

"Command, this is Skywatcher. Recon complete. Subject Fallen Star terminated by Subject Kingmaker," the officer reported, reviewing the camera footage from the control room they'd tapped into. "Be advised, subject Stonewall sent Kingmaker through Asset Broken Moon, appeared to be assassination attempt. Unknown if Kingmaker is terminated. Stonewall likely in position of Project Killshadow research as well, believed to be reason for assassination attempt. Stonewall currently leaving the area. Requesting orders" The other three men watched as their commander's shoulders slumped in disappointment; they knew he had a desire for revenge against both Kingmaker and Stonewall for their actions against them.

"Command has ordered us to fall back to the LZ. Don't worry boys, we'll get our chance soon. Kingmaker is off the board, so Stonewall will be a pushover" the second lieutenant said, sharing the grin that his three companions wore under their helmets. The four men took off as their Vertibird already began its landing approach. Through the pale moonlight, the symbol of twelve white stars surrounding a large white E stood proudly on the aircraft's fuselage.

 _ **Thank you guys for reading! I know that Cross died pretty violently and there was some graphic violence in this overall, but I would like to say that this WON'T be a cheerful story with occasionally dark moments. Its rated M for a reason. There will be graphic violence and people will die, particularly when the Wanderer is involved. The canon RWBY characters very likely won't come out unscathed either (thought I haven't planned that far ahead so worry not). I appreciate constructive criticism and tips, whatever can help me make this better for you guys! Also, I will try and implement a regular update schedule, although that may not arrive till April when I'm off school. I'm sincerely grateful for your patience!**_


	6. Chapter 6

_**At long last, Chapter 6 is finally here! I won't keep you so I'll put any and all relevant information below. From now on, I'll also start answering reviews like a normal person.**_

 _ **5 Coloured Walker: The reason the Lone Wanderer is who he is boils down to a number of things. He wasn't all that great of a person back in the Vault (by his own admission) and all he wanted to do was find his father for answers. I'm not sure if anyone really noticed this while playing Fallout 3, but to me the Brotherhood sort of just assumed he was with them. They never really said 'Hey, do you wanna join us or just get our help and go on your merry way?' That combined with Three Dog shoving LW on a pedestal and placing unrealistic expectations on him would, in my opinion, kinda mess with a person. Not to mention all the shit hes encountered in the wastes and the massive radiation blast courtesy of Project Purity. I plan on expanding on his whole character and why he is the way he is further in later chapters. As for Cross calling LW 'Satan', she'd pretty much broke at that point. The knowledge that a child you helped protect grew up and destroyed your family, along with launching a brutal manhunt against survivors and watching the people you looked after slaughtered before your eyes would place severe mental strain on someone; that doesn't even include the situation she was already in. When she finally saw a chance to get rid of LW, her mind snapped thanks to both the massive relief of stress and just her own slow mental deterioration. As for the Fallen Star thing, I'll admit I could have done better. Hope that relieves some curiosity!**_

 _ **To avoid possible future and current confusion, please note that the Courier and the Lone Wanderer are two different people. The Wanderer will make his friendly neighborhood introduction around chapter 8 or so. Stay tuned!**_

* * *

Chapter 6

Courier Six was currently having one of the best dreams he'd ever had in a long while. There was a bright blue sky with big fluffy white clouds, tall trees with beautiful crimson leaves, and soft green grass. All in all, it was paradise. It was a far cry from the nightmares he'd suffered from for seven years, especially _that_ nightmare, the one that had plagued him since the Divide. Pushing those thoughts out of his mind, he watched a flock of birds fly past, although he noticed that they were pitch black and had glowing red eyes encased in a white mask.

 _Strange,_ he thought as he watched them pass. Thinking nothing of it, he went back to enjoying the peace he'd longed for. The sway of the leaves in the wind, the chirp of crickets, the distant gunfire…

"Wait, gunfire?!" Six said aloud, bolting upright as he began looking around. His dream wasn't a dream, it was most definitely a reality. The grass, the sky, the trees, all of it. He soaked in the sights until a wave of pain washed over him.

"OW! Fucking headaches" he grumbled as he began massaging his temples to try and alleviate the pain. He started wracking his brain for any evidence of how he'd ended up in a forest. Six remembered going hunting, then running into a strange wolf-like creature. The image of a cave's interior, a weird bear with roughly the same appearance as the wolf, and a bright glowing light briefly floated across his vision.

 _Wait, did that light take me here? How? Speaking of which, where the fuck am I?_ The Courier began scanning his environment for clues. As he did so, he saw the full extent of his temporary resting place. He hadn't seen the ruins from his prone state but he couldn't argue that they weren't breathtaking. The placement of the arches and walls pointed towards what was once a temple or something similar; Six thanked God that he'd made a point to read a bunch of pre-war books on architecture. Closest to him was a massive circular structure, chipped and broken from what was probably centuries or maybe even millenniums worth of disuse. Six wasn't a crack detective, but he had a sinking feeling that the circle was at least partially responsible for his current predicament. That same feeling also told him that he definitely wasn't in Zion anymore and possibly not even on Earth.

"Well, no sense in mopping around. Might as well try and see if I can't find civilization or something. If there even is civilization" he sighed, picking himself up off the ground and walking out was obviously once a door. To his delight, he found his beautiful Service Rifle Mk.2 sitting close by.

"Oh, you beautiful thing, you. I don't know what I'd do if I lost you" Six gushed, rubbing his cheek against the weapon as if it were an animate object. Courier Six was well-known as a gun nut by those who knew him, his little display only reinforcing that fact.

"Now, lets see if the Pip-boy still works," Six wondered, checking over the device to make sure it wasn't damaged. "Weapons and ammo, check. Armor, check. Aid, check. Random crap, check. Map, chec...oooh thats not good" The wrist-mounted computer's map was blank, save for a message stating in bold letters:

ERROR: NO SATELLITE CONNECTION DETECTED

PLEASE CONTACT YOUR LOCAL ROBCO REPRESENTATIVE

FOR ASSISTANCE

"Well, lets see. I go from a cave to a bunch of ruins in the middle of a forest filled with crimson trees. I end up seeing weird birds with masks and red eyes. I have exactly zero GPS connection to any orbital navigation satellites which I should otherwise have," Six watched as five black wolves, like the one he'd run into outside the cave, walked out of the bushes in front of him and began surrounding him. "Now there's more of these damn white-masked wolves" he deadpanned as the wolves began growling at him. He couldn't help but smirk as his fingers danced over his wrist, a Machete Gladius materializing in one hand and his Weathered 10mm Pistol appearing in the other.

"So...who's first?" Six asked happily, adopting a defensive stance and bringing the tip of his pistol towards him in a 'bring it' motion. One of the wolves, likely the leader given the size, roared in defiance and charged at the upstart. Six held his ground and began pumping rounds in the creature, sprays of black blood confirming hits. The wolf kept barreling towards a wide-eyed Courier, who barely dodged out of the way as the creature charged past. It stumbled as it tried to slow itself down and turn to face the ex-mailman, only to feel the Gladius bite into its flesh. In one swift motion, Six cleanly and effortlessly removed the creature's head from its shoulders; the man chuckled as he noted what looked like shock on the creature's head before the entire body began evaporating.

 _Huh, never noticed that before_ , Six thought as he watched the event with surprise. The wolves took advantage of the distraction, however, as the Courier felt the wind knocked out of him courtesy of a sideswipe tackle from one of the jet black creatures.

The animal pinned Six underneath it, a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth trying to ripe his head off. He swore as he lost both his weapons and came down hard on his back, thanking the man upstairs that he'd had the presence of mind to reinforce the back. Holding the snarling creature at bay with his forearm, the Courier began running through any and all options he had.

 _Come on, think! You've survived worse! This thing won't hesitate to rip your arm off and play fetch with it while his buddies rip me to shreds!_ he thought frantically, before his eyes went wide at a revelation.

 _Wait, that's it!_ He grinned evilly at the creature above him, its teeth getting closer as it slowly overpowered him. He flexed his artificial arm and felt the artificial muscle within tense up and harden; Six would have to bring the Think Tank some nice new tech next time he saw them as thanks.

"Hey, buddy. Eat up!" the Courier told the creature above him with a stupid grin on his face. The high-strength fist shot up and to the right, meeting the wolf's temple. With a crack and a sickening _squelch_ , the fist drove through the thin bone there and sailed through, eventually exiting out the back so that the creature's head was impaled on Six's arm. The creature almost immediately went slack, its eyes (presumably) rolling into the back of its destroyed skull and its jaw hung open. With a grunt, the Courier pushed himself up, although it wasn't easy considering he had the weight of a (admittedly rapidly evaporating) body hanging off one of his limbs. He eyed the last vestiges of the wolf's face and thought he could see some form of surprise before it disappeared completely.

Six turned to the remaining two black wolves, who looked more like scared pups rather than the bloodthirsty hell beasts that had tried to eat him, although that didn't mean he wasn't still cautious. He was in an unfamiliar environment; who knows what its denizens were capable of.

"Boo!" he said, taking a step towards them. Both wolves snarled but fled all the same.

As he retrieved his gladius and his 10mm, Six couldn't help but smirk at how weirdly familiar the whole scene was.

 _Almost exactly like Cottonwood Cove_ , he thought to himself. _Although my fist went through Aurelius' chest rather than his head. Had to give them something at least somewhat recognizable enough to bury or whatever the Legion do_. It had been shortly after his trip to the Divide and the installation of his new arm by the Think Tank. He'd wanted to tie up some loose ends before the big fight, although the loose ends weren't so much that as most of the Legion's commanders. He'd pretty much massacred the garrison at the cove, the rest had run scared when he'd driven his fist through the centurion's armored torso in a morbid field test of the artificial limb's capabilities. It had performed exactly as promised and then some.

 _Ah, the look on Caesar's face when I came storming in and murdered the bastard_. The Courier had gone a little overkill on the last bit, however, as said overkill involved Caesar's throne, rope, the man himself, a lot of duct tape, and more than a few mini nukes and other assorted explosives. He'd been told afterwards that the resulting detonation had been seen as far away as the Mojave Outpost. That was also, coincidentally enough, around the same time he'd stopped drinking (binge drinking anyway; he still enjoyed the occasional bottle of booze).

"Now it's time to find out where in the hell I am, not that it'll count for much. Hopefully civilization isn't too far off" thought Six out loud as he began walking in a random direction. He knew it probably wasn't the most brilliant idea on his part, but anything was better than staying where massive mutant canines could ripe him to shreds.

It didn't take much walking before the Courier began hearing what sounded like fighting, complete with all the usual gunshots and yelled orders.

"Finally, people!" he said excitedly as he took off in a sprint towards the noises. Any normal human being would have turned around and gotten as far away as possible, but Six wasn't really a normal person.

 _Must be all the irradiated Mojave dust and, you know, getting brained by two 9mm_ , he thought amusingly as the distant battle rapidly grew into a crescendo of shots, yells, and bestial shrieks. Exploding through the trees, what met Six made him stop dead in his tracks.

He offered the only appropriate sentence that could be uttered at such a sight.

"What. The. Fuck." The Courier watched with a dumbfounded look on his face as what looked like around eight teens fought what could only be described as a radscorpion on steroids and a massive raven-thing with some of the most flashiest and confusing weapons he'd ever seen. During his travels in the Mojave and beyond, Six had seen and done some strange stuff. There'd been that time in New Reno where he'd somehow accidentally ended up in a porno (don't ask) or there was that incident with an entire space station nearly crashing on him (to this day, Six still wasn't sure how he'd survived that; his luck wasn't even that great). But the sight right in front of him? Here and now? It ranked pretty high on the 'What The Actual Hell Am I Looking At/Doing?' list; he knew he needed a shorter title but the current one seemed pretty appropriate at the moment.

"Ok, Six, get a hold of yourself. This is all just a dream. You were knocked out in that cave by a bright light and are not currently watching a bunch of what looks like colour-coded teens fighting with absurd weapons against a bunch of massive moooOH FUCK!" Six ducked at the last second as a massive piece of stone flew over his head, nearly decapitating him.

"Ok, never mind. Not a dream, definitely not a dream!" he said, hoping desperately that no more flying rocks would come his way. Hearing an ear-splitting screech, Six poked his head up to witness a girl with a massively oversized hammer driving the scorpion's stinger into the top of its head, the shockwave causing the bridge it currently sat on to collapse, taking the scorpion with it as it fell into the chasm below.

"You know, as crazy as this all seems, that was admittedly impressive" said Six, crouching down moments later as feathers from the giant bird impaled the ground around him. Annoyed, he looked up and glared at the creature.

"Alright, fuck this. Time to bring some good old-fashioned Pre-War artillery into the mix! Besides, I help these terrifying children and maybe they WON'T gut me with their terrifyingly huge weapons" he growled through his teeth as he began shifting through the weapons currently contained within his Pip-boy.

"Anti-material rifle? No, that probably won't work. Those kids have been hitting it with crap that looks a lot more powerful. Now let's see here…plasma rifle? Nope. Minigun? Nope. Wait…oh god yes. Come here you beautiful bastard you" With a quick tap, Six's selected weapon materialized in his hands while he smiled widely. The YCS/186 was one of his favorite weapons, not only because of its damage output but also because of how awesome the damn thing looked compared to normal gauss rifles. With its elongated thinner barrel, specialized muzzle brake, advanced scope, and a fully-enclosed stock, the thing looked like every sniper's wet dream. Steadying himself, with the same maniacal grin on his face, he sighted in the massive bird's skull. It was in a perfect position, facing directly towards him, although it didn't seem like it noticed him. Thankfully, his artificial arm eliminated virtually all the scope sway, allowing for a perfect shot. Centering the reticule dead centre between the creature's eyes, Six smirked.

"Kaboom"

* * *

Ruby's plan was perfect. Dangerous, but perfect. She'd even got Weiss to help with only a little berating! Her human catapult was definitely going to work! Then she'd be able to be all cool and show Weiss that she knew what she was doing! That was the plan anyway, if the skull of the Nevermore in front of them didn't explode in a shower of blood, pieces of bone, and brain, a static-filled _snap_ preceding the impact. Teams RWBY and JNPR watched dumbstruck as the decapitated corpse of the massive avian Grimm fell into the chasm beneath it, what was left of its head following soon after. The eight teens stood in silence for what seemed like hours, with Nora eventually breaking the veil.

"That. Was. AWESOME!" the hyperactive girl yelled, her arms shooting up into the air in a cheer. The other seven simply stared at her, wondering why she wasn't all that surprised that the Nevermore's head had randomly exploded. Then again, this was Nora they were thinking about; explosions were kind of her thing.

"Glad you thought so. Been too long since I've done that" The group snapped out of their daze, spinning around to meet the new voice; their weapons were locked, loaded, and levelled at the newcomer.

"GAH! Fuck, I was just trying to help! Can you please put down your terrifyingly varied and deadly-looking weapons or at the very least point them AWAY from the guy who was just saying hi?!" the stranger said, his strange-looking weapon (which Ruby thought looked SO COOL!) hitting the ground and his hands shooting up in surrender. The man was unlike anyone any of them had ever seen before. His clothes, or more accurately armor, looked worn and banged up; more than a few scratches sat on the armor. The equipment also looked like something someone would find in the military (or huntsman) rather than something a civilian might find. It consisted of an olive drab armored chest plate with an ammo bandolier slung over on shoulder and what seemed like a utility belt over the other, white-beige cargo pants, and armored boots the same color as the chest plate with integrated armored knee guards. He also wore some sort of battered, black duster coat with long sleeves that seemed to have armored plates sewn into them.

"Uh, kids? You gonna hold me at gunpoint all day or can we all play nice? I just helped save your lives, after all" the man said, a look of irritation spreading onto his face. Ruby just pouted at his statement.

"We had it covered! I had this awesome plan and you ruined it!" she told him, only to be met by a snort from behind her (undoubtedly Weiss) and a chuckle from the mysterious stranger.

"What plan was that exactly? Launch yourself at the massive angry-looking bird thing and hope you kill it?" he asked indignantly, seemingly trying to hold back laughter. All he was met with was silence.

"Oh, you have GOT to be kidding me! Where the hell did I end up that there's teens with massive weapons, weird murderous animals, and giant ruins in the middle of nowhere. Wait, scratch that last one; the West-Tek building back in California was pretty much in that same situation" the man said, his focus lost on the Ruby and the others, who looked at him with confusion as he rambled.

"What's West-Tek?" This question came from Ruby's sister Yang Xiao Long; she was honestly getting a kick out of how absurd this all was. The question made the man stop and look at her.

"West-Tek? It's an old…you know what, never mind. You wouldn't believe me. Now, can I please grab my weapon and come down there? I'm not so bad as to shoot a bunch of kids, even if they grossly outmatch me in terms of firepower" the man asked, his head nodding towards the strange rifle laying near his feet.

"Absolutely not! You honestly think we'd let some dirty-looking ruffian like you come near us with no idea what your intentions are or where you came from? If it were up to me, I would have sent you away by now!" shrilled Weiss; this man looked less like a civilized individual and more like one of those mercenaries her father would hire. A collective sigh escaped the lips of the other seven; they may have warmed up to her, but that didn't mean they didn't find her heiress tendencies irritating.

"One, I'll take the 'dirty-looking ruffian' part as a compliment, ice princess. Two, I'd love to explain everything to whoever the hell is in charge around here. Might be able to help me too" the armored man answered, a look of indifference on his face. This only irritated Weiss more, much to everyone's despair.

"Ice princess?! How dare you call me that! Don't you know who I am? I'm Weiss Schnee, heiress to the Schnee Dust Company!" the pale-skinned girl yelled.

"Dust? You're heir to a company that sells dirt? Pfft" the man answered, a barely concealed laugh escaping his lips. Everyone else couldn't help but join in. Weiss gave up and retreated to the back of the group, mumbling and grumbling under her breath. That exchange had broken the ice. The eight lowered their weapons, trying to hold in their laughter at the same time, while the man retrieved his own and hopped down the small rise to join them. Ruby was the first to notice his physical features now that they could see him better up close. His hair was worn down to his neck and a light black color, while his eyes were a striking burnt orange. His face held a few scars, most prominent of which were three long ones which ran across his face; they looked very much like claw marks from a large animal.

"So, shall we go on and find whoever is in charge of you kids? I have a lot of questions and I'm sure they do too, if the flying cameras are any indication" the man said, cradling his weapon like a baby. Ruby looked at him in confusion, as did the others, until he simply pointed a finger to the sky. Sure enough, once they followed it up they found a trio of flying cameras hovering above them.

"Huh" was the only answer to the discovery, muttered by Jaune as he watched the devices flit around. The man simply smiled a sly smile as he gestured them to lead on, the only protest coming from a still-grumbling Weiss; she received a pat on the head for her troubles from both Yang and the man.

Ozpin and Glynda watched the four along with the mysterious arrival through the newly-discovered cameras, a smile tugging at the corners of the former's mouth.

"Certainly observant, isn't he? Do you know who he is?" the headmistress asked, tapping a few buttons on her scroll; this caused the cameras to zoom in on the new face.

"I don't, but he certainly is interesting. He doesn't carry himself like either a huntsman or a civilian. More like-"

"A soldier?"

"Yes. An experienced one at that. He certainly fights like one, or as close as can be if the battle with those Beowolves were any indication"

"I don't know, Ozpin. I'm getting bad feelings from him. You're sure you want him here? At Beacon?"

"Glynda, I have been wrong about many things in the past, but I don't believe this is one of them. This man could contribute a great deal to the academy, not to mention give us plenty of information as to his identity" Glynda looked at the headmaster with a cocked eyebrow but eventually went back to her scroll; she'd worked with the man long enough to trust his judgement. Ozpin watched his own scroll while sipping his coffee, his trademark cane resting against his leg. All the while, a sly smile sat on his face.

 _Just who are you, young man? What have you done? I can see it in those eyes of yours. What horrors have you seen?_

* * *

 ** _Now for a proper author's note! The Courier's armor is a combination of the armor from the Elite Riot Gear and the Courier's Duster, an idea given to me by Red Guardsman (thank you btw!). The sleeves however were my own addition. Also starting next chapter, I will be having ODST110 preview and edit chapters when applicable; I would like to thank him for offering to do that and I am very grateful! As for the meeting between the Courier and Teams RWBY & JNPR, I am hoping I got at least some of their personalities (mainly Weiss and Ruby) accurate enough so as not to be too OOC. There'll be much greater interaction between the teams and Six in chapter 7; I am also hoping to God that I don't let myself fall as far behind as I did with this chapter and I will be trying to implement a proper update schedule in the near future. I have a Bloodborne-themed RWBY project in idea form but I'll probably hold off on that. If you want me to greenlight it, then I'll post one chapter and go from there. Hope you all enjoyed this chapter!_**


	7. Chapter 7

**_I present to you, chapter 7 of Tale of Two Legends! This has been sitting on my laptop for longer than I would have liked and is shorter than I'd intended, but considering the time frame between this update and the last I thought it'd be a necessary sacrifice. Related to that, I unfortunately did not have this read by ODST110 beforehand like I'd hope so I apologize for any errors or awkward sentence structure. If anyone notices anything and comments on it, I will edit it ASAP. Anyway, hope you all enjoy and thank you to those who have favorited and followed this story since last update! I greatly appreciate it!_**

Chapter 7

To say that Six was utterly confused at the circumstances he currently found himself in would be the understatement of the century. The last thing he'd expected when he'd woken up this morning was be stuck on somewhere that sure as hell wasn't Earth (if the fact there were actual trees in more than just a few clumps meant anything for one, let alone that they were red of all things), end up saving a group of kids that honestly didn't seem like they needed saving in hindsight, with the results being said kids currently taking him back to the headmaster of their school. According to the white-haired ice queen Weiss (apparently that nickname was WAY more common than he'd thought), it was some sort of combat school called Beacon Academy that trained these kids and others like them to fight creatures called Grimm, which were those things he'd apparently run into when he'd woken up.

Speaking of the kids, he'd actually managed to learn the rest of their names during their little trek back to civilization. The busty blonde's name was Yang Xiao Long while the shorter, hyperactive one with the love for the colour red was Ruby Rose; both were apparently sisters, despite not looking alike. Six just assumed they were stepsisters or something. The other blonde, a tall and scraggly-looking kid with a simple sword and shield, was named Jaune Arc; kid looked like a stiff breeze could kick his ass. Then there was the redhead named Pyrrha Nikos, who was apparently some sort of bigshot from a place named Mistral (God, his ears were still ringing from the berating Weiss had given him over not knowing who she was; he'd just given her the partial, not to mention bullshit, truth that he didn't get out too much; better to play his cards close to his chest for the time being). There was the unique duo that was Lie Ren and Nora Valkyrie, the latter of which wouldn't shut up about…well, he'd lost track of what she'd been rambling about, though he had caught mention of himself once or twice, somehow. Six was amazed that Ren hadn't lost his shit by this point, though judging by the smile on his face he'd probably had a history of hearing that stuff and likely found it somehow strangely endearing. Weiss, of course, needed no introduction. She'd made damn sure he knew who she was for the last hour, although thankfully he'd somehow managed to tune her out within the first twenty minutes or so; listening to the same songs on repeat for weeks and months on end tends to teach you that skill. The one who happened to be most interesting to him, however, was Blake Belladonna.

Unlike all the others, she'd barely said a word aside from her name and had stuck to the rear of the group, sticking even farther to the rear then he was. The others might have not noticed, but Six sure as hell had: she seemed constantly on guard, always on edge. Her amber eyes darted back and forth, like she was keeping an eye out for something or, possibly more accurate, someone. Either that, or she was way more nervous about those Grimm creatures then she let on to her friends, something Six highly doubted. Her hand subconsciously stayed in a position where she could draw her katana and engage with ease. Most curiously and intriguingly of all, though, was that look in her eyes. Hell, he had the same look himself, he knew that. The eyes of a killer. Now, he'd seen what the wasteland did to kids. He knew what it cost them. But here? In a beautiful and potentially awesome place like this? No one should have that look to them, at least not yet, not any time soon. Especially not at this age. Her twitching bow also drew his attention. As far as he knew, bows weren't supposed to twitch. Clearly, it was both too soon for him to ask and it was frankly none of his business. Of course, he hadn't been as successful as he'd been without a bit of curiosity guiding his step. So, Six would just have to wait for whatever opportunity, if any, presented itself to learn why the hell Blake's damn bow was twitching.

"So, mind telling me where we're going? I like to at least have a clue of what I'm walking into. Gives me a better chance of survival that way" Six asked, adjusting his grip on the YCS. He didn't have to, but he didn't want these kids and whoever was watching on those airborne cameras to know all his tricks (though, if the latter had caught him when he first arrived or when he was in the underbrush, they could have seen his little 'magic trick'). Not surprisingly, the ice princess answered first.

"We're going back to Beacon Academy, you dolt. Its Remnant's greatest academy, training future huntsmen and huntresses to defend humanity's future and take back our world from the Grimm" she told him. _Well, that answers two things at least: what this place is called and where we're heading_ , Six thought, though he couldn't help but role his eyes at Weiss's answer.

"Thanks for that wonderfully pre-written speech, kid. Also, watch the tone. Didn't your parents ever teach you to respect your elders?" he told her, a small frown on his face. He'd dealt with snot-nosed kids in the past, but he could always excuse their behaviour given the circumstances of the surroundings. This girl, however, reminded him more of that Brahmin baron's son he'd rescued back at the Ultra-Luxe. Spoiled, rich, and thinking that she could get whatever the hell she wanted with nothing more than a simple demand. If he was truly stuck here, he doubted the two of them would get along. Weiss just sent a glare Six's way and turned her back on him, not that he minded that much; last thing he wanted to deal with was a brat.

"So, what kind of name is Six, anyway? That can't be your birth name, otherwise your parents REALLY hated you" Yang said, trying to lighten the mood or at least diffuse some of the simmering tension between him and Weiss. The eight teens had all sent him varying looks of confusion and/or disbelief when he'd told them his 'name'; he had to admit, he couldn't blame them all that much. Then again, what the hell kind of name was Yang Xiao Long?

"It isn't, you're right. It's a nickname, but I've gone by it for so long that it might as well be," the Courier answered, shifting the Gauss Rifle slung over his shoulder. "Also, before you ask, yes I have an actual name but I'd prefer to keep my secrets to myself, if that's alright" he added, maybe a little bit more forcefully than he should have, if the blonde's subtle wince was anything to go by. At the same time, however, he had to reinforce the fact that his secrets were his to reveal when and if he chose too. Kids could get mighty curious when faced with the prospect of discovering something hidden and likely wouldn't rest until they found out exactly what was so necessary to keep hidden.

The group was largely silent as they continued on towards this Beacon Academy Weiss had mentioned, save for the occasional inquiry from one of the kids about Six (which he almost always skirted, unless he could answer in a way that revealed little) and Ruby's constant pestering about the YCS. He'd seen some shit, but how such a small, adorable, and innocent girl could obsess so heavily over weapons honestly freaked him out just a bit. Although, the girl's massive scythe should have been one hell of a red flag. Grimm had also occasionally popped up, which had predictably ended with the poor bastards being basically nuked from orbit; Six had barely put any effort in, as in his eyes the kids were basically weapons of mass destruction on their own.

 _If the bombs were replaced by a ton of kids like this during the Great War, humanity would probably be extinct_ , mused the Courier as they arrived at a sheer cliff wall. A massive lift enclosed by a glass canopy and surrounded by what seemed like an energy shield, with a set of what Six assumed was emergency stairs snaking up the cliff face close by; this was also enclosed by an energy shield.

"Uh, shouldn't we, you know, deactivate the force field or something?" the Courier asked as the kids continued walking towards it without a care in the world. In Six's experience, that was generally a very bad idea that resulted in (admittedly glorious) messy explosions. Weiss simply tossed him a glare over her shoulder and scoffed.

"It's tuned to our Auras, you idiot. The Grimm don't have any, therefore they can't get through" Upon learning said information, Six now faced two problems. One, he didn't know what the hell Aura was (somehow, it'd never came up during their trek back), which in and of itself wasn't that big of a deal. However, the second provided a much more pressing issue. He didn't have whatever Aura was. This, of course, potentially equalled a possibly messy and most certainly painful death before he'd even gotten his feet planted in this new world, something he honestly wanted to avoid by any means necessary.

The heiress must of sensed the gears turning in the Courier's head (or seen his horrified expression) because she pinched the bridge of her nose and audibly sighed.

"You don't have your Aura unlocked, do you?" she asked, the irritation in her voice clear; Six simply shook his head. He was desperately trying to come up with some sort of excuse (and also trying to think what the girl meant by 'unlocked') and decided to use the best one he could come up with.

"I…uh…I've lived in the boonies all my life. Never saw a need" he said, hoping that his excuse made enough sense. Maybe whoever was controlling those flying cameras had control of the energy field as well and could shut it off just for him? Weiss's eye twitched and Six could swear he saw steam starting to emerge from her ears; the prospect of angering the young upstart brat made Six feel just a bit better about his current predicament.

"GAH, I'M SURRONDED BY IDIOTS!" she shouted, throwing up her hands and stomping back over to the other teens, leaving Six to stand awkwardly in front of them. Before anyone suggested anything else (although that didn't mean the other teens weren't currently racking their brains for a solution, by the looks of it), a quiet voice emerged from the group.

"I can unlock your aura for you" Blake stepped forward, not the cautious mess she was in the forest (although Six could still see an element of tension in her figure) but striding forward confidently. No one stopped her, although Weiss seemed to have grumbled something due to the fact that Yang and Ruby shot her a look, and the girl stopped just inches from Six's armored form, which dwarfed her by a few inches if not an entire foot. He didn't move a muscle as she placed one hand over his heart and another on the back of his head, gently moving it so their foreheads touched. Granted, Six was weirded right the hell out by what was going on, but considering these teens were his only real access to answers (and civilization) he'd accepted the fact that he had to play ball, as strange as said ball currently was.

"For it is in passing that we achieve immortality. Through this, we become a paragon of virtue and glory to rise above all," Six couldn't help but scoff internally. He wasn't anywhere close to being either a paragon or virtuous, no matter what the legends of the Mojave said. "Indefinite in distance and unbound by death, I release your soul, and by my shoulder, protect thee" the raven-haired girl finished, letting out a quiet sigh. Her eyes slowly opened, having closed as she began the chant, and looked at Six curiously. He stared back, a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth and his burnt orange eyes full of mirth. Before either could say anything, the sound of electronics and subtle hissing sounded out behind Blake. Six looked up to see the field had powered itself down and the elevator platform had lowered itself into position; the other seven teens had already taken their places, with Weiss sending the pair an impatient and annoyed glare.

"Well, shall we?" asked Six, sweeping an arm toward the platform. Blake studied his features for a second, as if searching for an answer to questions that were undoubtedly running through her mind, before turning to join her friends, Six following close behind. Just before he took his own place on the elevator, he tossed a glance at the aerial cameras still hovering above them. A small smirk spread across his face as he threw to small devices a quick two-fingered salute.

 _Thanks, whoever you are. See you real soon._


	8. Chapter 8

**_I present to you, Chapter 8 of Tale of Two Legends! Thank you to everyone who's stuck with this and been extremely patient waiting for this chapter. With that, lets get to it!_**

* * *

Chapter 8

Despite the late hours of the night being a prime opportunity for a little late-night partying, one of Vale's most famous nightclubs, known as Club Big Bear, was relatively quiet. There were a few patrons here and there, but not nearly the amount that the club usually drew on its best night.

 _All 'cause of the damned blonde_ , Hei Xiong, the club's owner, thought as he wiped down the bar and cleaned some drinking glasses. Ever since that Blondie had come in and wrecked the place, people had been wary of going anywhere near the club even with the beefed-up and up-armed security that Xiong had added. To be honest, even this many people present was good. Hei had been making steps to improve the club's image and fix his own reputation, but so far it'd been a long road to recovery.

The sound of the club's door snapped Hei out of his thoughts. He began giving a once-over to the newcomer. He looked homeless, to be perfectly honest, with ratty, tattered, and faded jeans combined with frayed fingerless gloves and an old green bomber jacket; Hei noted the jacket's hood was drawn up and big enough to shroud the man's face in darkness. He watched the stranger look around, his hood staying up as he did so, before his non-visible gaze centered on the bar. The homeless man sauntered over and plopped himself onto one of the chairs that Hei hadn't had to put back together, waving his glove-covered hand at Hei to signal he wanted some service.

Although Hei didn't really want to serve the guy, at this point he couldn't really afford to be picky; he still needed to pay the bills after all.

"What can I get you?" the club owner asked, tossing his cleaning rag over his shoulder. The man inspected the drink selection behind Hei before answering.

"Whatever your best whiskey is" he answered. Hei was surprised at the voice that imitated from underneath the hood, the guy sounded younger than Hei had took him for (though the club owner had to admit, the stereotype of an old homeless guy didn't realy help). Nevertheless, the guy didn't exactly look like he could afford what he was asking for.

"That would be Atlesian Malt Whiskey. I'm gonna need to see some Lien though buddy. Can't let a guy who just walked in from the street take my best stuff" Hei told him, crossing his arms across his chest and standing tall. He couldn't say what it was, but Hei Xiong was getting a _very_ bad feeling from the man in front of him.

A low chuckle sounded from the hood. "Look asshole, I've had a long ass day. I had to fight through a million wolves on steroids after trying to wipe out a bunch of cunts who've been trying to kill me ever since I broke up their little club, nearly got crushed by a giant twin-headed snake thing, got shot at by a guy I trusted with my life, got sucked through something out of a bad scifi serial, and now I'm in some place that is most definitely not my world. So, could you please FUCKING humour me and get me a damn drink!" the man finished, his voice having risen during his monologue to the point where he'd silenced the entire club; even the music had stopped. The man had an aura of utter fury and madness emanating from him, the fact that his hood had stayed up all the while only added to said aura. Despite all this, Xiong stood firm.

"You know what? Get the FUCK out of my club" he said, reaching for the weapon he kept under the bar while he signaled for his men to begin surrounding the guy. The man must have noticed, because he got up from his seat, sighing as he did so. Everyone tensed, the memories of Blondie's rampage playing through their heads and desperately hoping that this didn't end up the same.

Xiong felt something impact his shoulder, causing him to fall back against the display case, the bottles threatening to fall on top of him. It took the gangster a second to realize that a serrated military-style combat knife had embedded itself in his shoulder; he looked at it in disbelief, something like that couldn't have knocked him over, could it? _How much force did he throw it with?_

Hei looked up at the man, finally being able to see what he looked like now that his hood had fallen down. His sweat-covered hair was the colour of copper wire, with the familiar colour of blonde mixed in, albeit a few shades lighter. His pale, ice green eyes bored into him; anger and, most terrifyingly, joy rolling behind his eyes.

"You know, all I wanted was a drink when I walked in," the man said, cracking his neck as a manic grin spread across his face. "But in this case, your blood'll work _just_ fine"

"Strange, Hei isn't answering his phone. That's unlike him" Roman Torchwick stared at the scroll, confusion etched on his face. Hei knew his boss and him were on their way; he highly doubted the man wouldn't answer or ignore a call, especially today. The fact that the man didn't pick up immediately worried him and his white-knuckled grip on the car's steering wheel showed it. He was a professional criminal and master thief, heightened caution and the occasional bout of paranoia was in the job description. Right now, his instincts were screaming to him that something was up and they'd never failed him before.

"Something wrong, Roman?" a svelte voice spoke out from the back seat. Roman glanced at the rear-view mirror, the blazing amber eyes of his current boss Cinder Fall meeting his dark-green ones, the woman's eyebrow cocked in a questioning manner. Roman couldn't help but chuckle nervously; he'd seen what happened when Cinder got annoyed, let alone irritated. Suffice to say, the White Fang had had to bury more than a few urns filled with ashes.

"Hei isn't picking up. I'm sure he's alright though. I've known the man a long time and he's been in the business even longer, he can handle himself" Cinder just rolled her eyes and continued typing away on her scroll, her two lackeys Emerald and Mercury pre-occupying themselves with Oum knows what. By the time Hei's nightclub was in sight, Roman's instincts were practically screaming at him.

"We're here" Roman said, turning off the engine and grabbing Melodic Cudgel from the passenger's seat.

"Fuck" he mumbled under his breath. Judging from the blood staining the club's front windows, his instincts were more than right.

"What was that about Hei being able to handle himself?" Mercury asked rhetorically, a twinge of mirth underlying his question. Both Roman and Cinder glared at the silver-haired merc, shutting the man up quick. With Roman at the front (not that the thief appreciated the arrangement), the group moved into the building. What met them was a massacre. What's more, the only man standing? He was currently drinking a glass of whiskey at the bar next to Hei Xiong, pinned to said bar courtesy of a knife through his hand. The man looked completely laid back, as if he wasn't sitting amongst a pile of dismembered and occasionally scorched corpses; it actually took the stranger what seemed like ages to even notice them.

The stranger looked them over the same way he'd look at something in a store, cocking his eyebrow as he did so. He took one last swig of his glass before setting it down on the bartop and pulling himself from his stool, patting Hei on the shoulder as he did so; not surprisingly, this elicited a groan from the man. The man simply chuckled at this as he walked towards Cinder and her group; the amber-eyed woman couldn't help but tense up. _What is this feeling I'm getting from him? It's nothing like what I feel from Madame Salem, but it is certainly reminiscent, dare I say even close to her._

"So, you people the friends of Big Beard over there?" the man asked, tossing a thumb over his shoulder in Xiong's direction. "Sorry to say, he ain't exactly taking any visitors right now. If he'd given me a fucking drink when I asked he wouldn't be stapled to a bar top now would he?!" said the man, his voice rising as he looked over his shoulder at the club's unfortunate owner. Cinder cocked an eyebrow while Roman snorted in restrained laughter; Emerald and Mercury were both dumbstruck.

"Man, all of this for a drink? I know Junior serves some good booze but it's not this good!" Roman told the man, sweeping his arms at the gore and destruction around him. It was the stranger's turn to cock an eyebrow. He opened his mouth to answer but Cinder beat him to it.

"We are merely acquaintances, and we were here to recover some information Mr. Xiong had. Of course, courtesy of your escapades here that will make said recovery much more difficult Mr.?" The stranger smirked (Roman subtlety shivered, as the man's smirk wasn't too far off Neo's trademark smile when she was 'on the hunt'). "You can call me the Lone Wanderer," the man said, giving Cinder a mock exaggerated bow. "Also, before you ask, yes I have a real name and no, I won't be sharing it with you. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to find a place to sleep that's preferably not a street corner" The Wanderer tried to leave, only to be blocked by Emerald and Mercury with Roman's Melodic Cudgel levelled at his head.

"I didn't say you could leave," said Cinder, walking up to the man. She grabbed the man's chin roughly and glared at him, angry amber eyes boring into playful yet annoyed ice green orbs; she began applying her semblance to the man's face, however he seemed to barely notice. "I came here to get something from Mr. Xiong and now, thanks to your apparent recklessness and what I can only guess is a love of violence, I can now longer collect what I'm here for. Someone should be punished for that, don't you think?" The stranger's only response was to begin chuckling, much to Cinder's annoyance.

"Look lady, sorry for inconveniencing you and your merry little band here but I needed a drink. Junior over there wouldn't give me one, so I simply got my own. Nothing wrong with that, right?" he said, wrenching his face away from Cinder's iron grip and rubbing his jaw. "Now I have to worry about finding some place to sleep tonight and I _really_ don't need another shitstorm added to an already shitty day. Now, can I please get the fuck out of here? Thanks" He tried to push his way through, only to be stopped by Emerald and Mercury, the former's weapons drawn and the latter in a kickboxing stance while Cinder and Roman stood off to the side. The man at first sighed but a sinister smile spread onto his face.

"Well, 'when in Rome'. These guys weren't that much of a fight. Let's see if you two kids fight any better" he told them, drawing two serrated combat knives with spiked knuckle guards from his jacket in an upside-down position.

* * *

Truth be told, the Wanderer really wasn't in the mood to fight. After the assault on Raven Rock and the subsequent battle with the Brotherhood remnants, Jericho's little surprise and the first bar fight (though he had to admit, that one was on him), the former vault dweller was starting to feel the fatigue, which was saying something given his usually massive stamina. However, it was already clear to him that he wouldn't be leaving here without getting in a dust-up.

He eyed the two teens in front of him; all the time spent in the Wasteland taught him that underestimating an opponent, even just a little bit, meant you were screwed. The green-haired one had some wicked-looking sickles with what looked like firearms built in if the trigger was anything to judge by. As for the cocky-looking kid beside her, the Wanderer figured there was something up with the greaves on his legs. _Maybe to add more weight to his kicks?_ he thought. There was also Bowler Hat and the Lady in Red behind them, God knows what they could do; the cane was likely the former's weapon though the Wanderer couldn't see any visible weapon on the latter, didn't mean she didn't have one tucked away somewhere.

"Hey, old man. You just gonna stand there and look or are you gonna throw down?" said Silver, a shit-eating smirk on his face.

The Wanderer just shook his head, a smirk of his own spreading across his face. "How old are you kid?"

"Why does it matter?" Silver replied, agitation lacing his voice.

"Just answer the question"

"Nineteen. Why?"

The Wanderer let out a low chuckle. "Not even old enough to drink where I come from. When I was your age, I was killing people just to get a place to sleep and some scraps of food"

"So what? I've killed my father because he was an asshole" said Mercury, that stupid cocky smirk still plastered across his face. The Wanderer just rolled his eyes. Without another word, the Wanderer rushed forward. Before anyone could even blink, he delivered a brutal-looking right hook to the silver-haired teen's face, following it up with a forward slash at Green's stomach. Silver was sent flying into a booth, the impact turning the table to splinters. Meanwhile, the Wanderer registered his confusion as the green-haired girl dodged without a scratch on her.

 _What the fuck? I hit her dead on; her side should be sliced open and gushing red. And what the hell was that resistance I felt when I hit her? Felt like the knife almost bounced off_ , he thought, looking at his knife in complete confusion. The momentary lack of attention nearly cost him, as Green Hair attempted to drive her sickles into the Wanderer's skull, only for the latter to just barely block the strike with his forearms. He winced as the blades cut into his skin but pushed her away and again attempted to stab into the girl's sides with both knives, only to yet again meet that same subtle resistance from before.

By now the Wanderer's anger at any lack of visible hits on the girl was growing, but he quickly quashed it to avoid losing his cool; losing your head in a close quarters fight like this meant you lost.

Snarling, he rushed the girl again. She brought her blades up in front of her to block, only for her to feel the force of the Wanderer's punch drive into her side followed up by her head snapping back courtesy of a brass knuckle-enhanced uppercut. This knocked the girl back, causing her to stumble and grab her jaw as blood trickled out of the corner off her mouth.

 _Took long enough. Need to end this before Silver gets back up_ , the Wander thought, a satisfied smile spreading across his face. Readying his knives, he prepared to finish Greenie but was interrupted by the sound of debris moving.

Before the Wanderer could react, Silver shot out towards him. The ex-vault dweller felt the impact of Silver's kick before he could react and next thing he knew; he was sailing through the air courtesy of the shotgun blast that had emerged from the teen's boot. His back collided hard with the bar, dozens of bottles shattering under the impact, with the force helping several dozen shards of glass imbed themselves into his back. The Wanderer hit the ground hard, blood splattering across the floor as he coughed up what he assumed were the results of organs being hit by what felt like a truck and the large amount of buckshot that had buried themselves into his torso. His mind immediately went into survival mode, honed over years and hundreds of near death experiences out in the wastes. He propped himself up against the bar top and lifted up his shirt. His chest was a complete mess, looking like a wood chipper had been taken to his torso; many of the holes continued to leak blood at an impressive rate. Were he anyone else, he'd be dead.

 _I'm the fucking Lone Wanderer. No two-bit teens with fancy boots and sickles can kill me_ , the Wanderer thought, sending mental signals to his Pip-boy thanks to the wrist-mounted computer being connected directly to his nervous system. It didn't take long to feel the numbing sensation of a couple doses of Med-X flowing through his veins, followed by the sensations of several Stimpaks worth of healing chemicals starting to stitch his broken body and push the buckshot out of his body. _Fuck, even with Med-X this hurts like a bitch_ , the ex-vault dweller thought as he felt bones reset themselves and organs repair the damage. He could hear the voices he recognized as the Lady in Red talking to Greenie and Silver. He figured the woman wasn't stupid; it was almost certain that she'd send one or both of her little thugs to make sure he was finished. The damage to his body was also completely repaired by now, though the Med-X had started to fade and by extension the discomfort had grown.

Even with his body healed, the Wanderer knew he couldn't resume the fight lest he die for real and that wasn't something he had in mind, especially not until he shoved a shotgun up Jericho's ass and pulled the trigger.

 _First things first, new clothes and weapons_. The Wanderer mentally selected his favorite outfit, the greatcoat of General Constantine Chase (modified for better utility and greater protection, of course) and let it digistruct around him. He had to admit, as shitty as pre-war America might have been, they did make some great shit. Next, he let Jingwei's Shocksword and Vampire's Edge drop into his hands. While he wasn't planning on a direct fight, with what he had in mind he'd need some heavier hitting weapons than a pair of trench knives.

 _Let's see here, sure I had some explosives somewhere…here we go. Paybacks a bitch, assholes_.

* * *

Cinder had to admit, despite the stranger being an arrogant and cocky drunk, he certainly knew how to handle himself. Although they were nowhere near her level, Mercury and Emerald were certainly strong; for that man to blow Mercury away in one punch and nearly slice Emerald open with relative ease (even if it was a short fight and neither of the two teens were truly giving it their all) was surprisingly amusing and maybe (although Cinder would never admit this out loud) a tad bit impressive.

"What have I drilled into you two? Never let your guard down with an opponent. You're aim during a fight should be to take away any advantage they have and crush them" Cinder told the two as they brushed themselves off and checked themselves over. Mercury was the worse off of the two, although his Aura had already begun to heal the numerous cuts and bruises that littered his body while Emerald was relatively fine, although her Aura was significantly depleted.

"Yes, Cinder"

"Sorry, boss"

Cinder looked between the two and rolled her eyes. With Junior out of commission, she'd have to find another way to discover where exactly the Fall Maiden had been taken; although Cinder knew she was in Vale and was more than likely in Ozpin's possession, she had no idea where Beacon's headmaster was keeping her.

"Mercury, go make sure our unwanted visitor won't get back up again, will you?" ordered Cinder, tilting her head towards the smashed up bar. Nodding, the silver-haired teen trudged over to the counter but was interrupted by a low chuckle that emanated from behind the bar.

"Guess what, assholes? I'm ba-aa-ck!" the voice, which Cinder realized was the stranger, should mockingly. Mercury tensed up, expecting him to jump out at him, only for two large cylindrical objects to fly at him. Cinder watched Mercury inspect the objects then immediately begun running towards them. "Get down! _GRENADES!"_ he shouted, before he was tossed forward as both bundles detonated. Shortly after, the second bundle exploded; the explosion covered the entire area in a thick layer of smoke, making it next to impossible to see properly.

Cinder attempted to regain her senses through the thick layer of smoke, her eyes watering and her arm covering her mouth; she knew that the stranger would launch an attack and she wanted to be ready. Even if he was weakened by Mercury's strike, he'd created a tactical advantage for himself that would prevent Cinder, Emerald, and Mercury from launching a counterattack properly.

Cinder caught movement out of the corner of her eye, just a shadow but something had definitely moved.

"GAAAH!" Cinder recognized the shout as belonging to Mercury; it was likely his current location was the same as the electric blue glow and crackle of electricity off to her front left. Realizing that her two henchmen would be little help (Roman had pretty much taken off at the first sign of trouble; she'd had no idea where he'd run off too, much to her annoyance), Cinder activated the Dust woven into her dress, two black obsidian blades forming in her hands. She began backing up, putting as much distance between the stranger's possible position and her own; the more distance he'd potentially have to cross, the greater her reaction time.

"ARGH!" That was Emerald, her position obscured by the eerie red glow that bathed the smoke to her front right.

 _He's getting closer. Those two were useless again, of course_ , Cinder though disdainfully. She'd have to ramp up their training and make sure they could actually handle themselves against an experienced opponent like this man was proving to be. She had to admit, she was surprised when a man who was seemingly nothing more than a drunk (she didn't count Junior's thugs or Junior himself as proper combatants; if they could be defeated by a huntress-in-training than she didn't like their prospects) was able to not only send Mercury flying with one punch but had come dangerously close to gutting Emerald were it not for Mercury's timely intervention. Even now, after receiving a hit that likely would have shattered Aura and likely killed a normal person, the stranger had simply gotten back up after what only seemed like a few moments to continue the attack, even using tactical planning. Cinder was most intrigued.

In all her internal thinking, she failed to sense the dark shape approaching behind her. She froze as she heard the crackle of electricity in one ear and a soft hum in the other, with the latter accompanied by her Aura on that side going crazy.

"Its not nice to sneak up on someone, you know" Cinder said with a smirk, although internally she was cursing herself for not focusing.

"Well, when that someone sends her two thugs to try and kill me, I don't play nice" the stranger said behind her a hard edge to his voice. Cinder turned and was met with a pair of ice green eyes that seemed to glow with an unearthly light, a sea of anger and irritation roiling behind them.

"Well, you nearly killed my contact, who isn't likely to give me what I need now anyway. Someone had to be punished" she answered, her voice still smooth and calm. Although she still wasn't entirely sure if this man was some sort of hunter or simply a well-trained civilian, she still kept her guard up; she was confident in her abilities and could more than likely end the man easily if she so wanted too (a part of her was honestly wondering why she hadn't, now that she thought about it)

"The guy should have given me a drink when I asked. Now," the man said, lifting the glowing red blade level to Cinder's face, the feeling of her Aura going haywire moving from her side to her face. "Can I leave or are we gonna have to do this all over again? Your two thugs are already down and I haven't seen the bowler hat guy at all, so it is your turn"

"If I recall, one of my 'thugs' nearly killed you when he launched you into that bar"

"Yeah, well I'm a special type of guy. One who can have a ton of shit thrown at him and still come out relatively unscathed" he answered, followed by a low chuckle.

"Are you a hunter, then?" Cinder asked. She wanted any and all potential variables known to her when it came to her plans; if this man was a hunter and walking the streets, she wanted to have a plan to deal with him.

"A hunter? No, sweetheart," he said, his voice going low. A low buzz began emanating from him, accompanied by the smell of ozone; Cinder tensed and flared her Aura, ready for a possible attack. "I'm just your above-average, high-functioning psychopath, possibly sociopath. But you can call me the Lone Wanderer" As if on cue, the man disappeared, followed by a belch of ozone and a crackle. Cinder realized that the sound wasn't a preparation for an attack, but was some sort of device; of course, she arrived at the conclusion too late to matter.

The doors swung open, the smoke rapidly clearing as it flowed out into the night. Cinder sighed, her weapons disappearing as Dust back into her dress. She was just as angry at herself as she was at Roman, Mercury, or Emerald (the latter two were still both in a heap on the floor, still alive judging by their movements), as she had failed to remove a potential obstacle to her plans and had instead allowed herself to be caught up in a conversation with the now-named Lone Wanderer ( _What kind of name is that, anyway?_ thought Cinder). However, she realized this also presented her with a possible opportunity. It was highly unlikely that this man was with Ozpin, who'd never employ a man who openly destroyed a bar and attempt to actively kill its security and owner simply because they refused him a drink. The man didn't seem to have the same sort of subtlety that Ozpin prided himself on either; it was clear that this Lone Wanderer was much more of an offensive type; even the stealth he'd just displayed had been used to intimidate and eliminate his enemies with extreme prejudice (she was surprised Mercury and Emerald were even alive). So it was probable that he was a free agent, a new chess piece in the game that Ozpin and Cinder's mistress had long been playing. Cinder decided that this new piece, no matter what, would become her mistress'. _He has the potential to be a very powerful piece, indeed_ she thought, smirking, as she turned away from the door to attempt to get her henchman and woman in at least a semblance of working order.

From a side booth, Roman Torchwick finally made himself known. Pushing himself up and brushing himself off, he was met by the angry gaze of Cinder Fall.

"Soooo…what'd I miss?" he asked, only to be met by his hat bursting into flames courtesy of a very pissed off Cinder.

* * *

As the Stealth Boy wore off, the Wanderer hauled himself onto a roof top in front of the club. Making sure no one else was around, he collapsed into the roof, thankful for the breather. His chest still hurt like a bitch, so he took another dose of Med-X to dull the pain until he could get somewhere safe and fully inspect his wounds. They'd surprisingly felt better after he'd hit that green-haired girl with Vampire's Edge, but he'd thought nothing of it at the time. Although he knew he wasn't on Earth (if the shattered moon above him was any indication), he still had no idea where he actually was, something he'd have to rectify sooner rather than later.

"Alright, first things first. Find somewhere mildly safe and settle down for what could be the long haul. I'll worry about supplies later" the Wanderer told himself. Pushing himself off the ground, it wasn't long before he spotted what looked like a port not far off. It looked pretty much abandoned if the lack of lights or any real noise was any indication and with what were likely a dozen or so large warehouses it wouldn't take long to find shelter. The buildings were packed relatively close enough that he could jump across them safely, at least until he got comfortably far enough away from the shit show that club had become.

 _Well, here we go I guess_ , the Wanderer thought, taking off towards shelter.

* * *

 ** _I hope you all enjoyed the first encounter between the Lone Wanderer and Cinder! I'll be honest, this was one of the first fight scenes I've properly written so I apologize if it's a little stiff and rough around the edges (any feedback to improve these scenes is always appreciated!)._**

 ** _The way the fight was supposed to go went through a dozen different iterations in my mind, several involving Power Armor and the Wanderer bursting through the wall with his own custom suit and a minigun. As for how I plan to display Pip-boys in this story, they're going to utilize minimization and digitization technology that I've seen other Fallout stories use. It does make a semblance of sense from a certain viewpoint, especially with the way Fallout 4 displays its items as wireframes on its Pip-boy and how they disappear when you holster them. Also, to clear up any potential questions concerning the blade Vampire's Edge. Just the way the sword is named and who owns it in Fallout 3 (in case some haven't played it, its owned by a pseudo-vampire named Vance), I kind of have the idea in my head that it would supernaturally suck the life out of victims (it sounds overpowered, but I don't plan on going that crazy with it); since Aura is an extension of one's soul in the RWBY universe, it makes sense that Aura would have a slight tendency to go nuts when that things near. All-in-all, although I don't plan on making it OP, it is still a very dangerous weapon against hunters and huntresses._**

 ** _Next up is the Courier meeting Ozpin for the first time, explaining just where he comes from, and getting settled into Beacon. I promise Chapter 9 won't take me as long to upload as Chapter 8 did. Also, thank you to everyone who has followed and favorited this story, both new and old!_**


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